Cure for Cancer

Somebody has finally found a cure for cancer. Merck has developed a vaccination that prevents cervical cancer with staggering statistical significance. Glaxo is close on their heels with a similar vaccine. Call the neighbors, wake the children, get this puppy on the market, right?

Well, our friends in the Bush administration are likely to resist approval of the vaccines because it angers their benefactors on the religious right. In another skirmish in this administration's war on science, they will argue that this vaccine gives young girls a license to have underage sex. They believe that unhealthy sexual habits lead to cervical cancer and by giving girls this vaccine, they will be giving them a license for promiscuity.

I don't know the answer, but I wonder how many young girls delay their defloweration out of a concern for cervical cancer? According to the article from the New Yorker linked above, the average age that girls lose their virginity is under seventeen. The Bush theocrats are unhappy with this and seek to stem this tide with anti-science (and anti human-nature) actions like not availing girls of this vaccine, pouring tons of money into abstinence education, and keeping young folks away from rubbers. Similarly, they will not financially support efforts to educate people about condoms in AIDS-ravaged sub-Saharan Africa.

Part of me wishes that we could compare the average age at which girls lost their virginity in the 16th century (think of thirteen or fourteen year-old Romeo and Juliet) with current statistics. I think sexual behavior starts after puberty and there would not be a statistically significant age difference in the onset of such behavior through time immemorial. This would conclusively say what we already know - that the Bushies are trying to fight human nature. Unfortunately, such conclusive statistical proof would surely be shrugged off as fuzzy math or some other witches brew of illogic concocted by the reigning Evangelical inquisition.

So there you have it. Add this insult to the injuries of global warming, stem-cells, and all the rest, and pity the imminently avoidable deaths due to cervical cancer.