CALGARY, Alberta — Never one to shrink from a fight, Bishop Fred Henry of Calgary is taking on the public health establishment that wants to give thousands of Catholic girls the human papilloma virus vaccine, which protects against the sexually-transmitted disease.
The media-savvy bishop may be found as often on the “left” of the political spectrum on economic issues as on the “right” on matters of sexual morality, but he can always be found. When he was targeted last month by an ad hoc group of lawyers, doctors and bioethicists for barring the doors of the city’s tax-funded Catholic schools to public health officials, he gave as good as he got.
Juliet Guichon, a spokeswoman for the would-be vaccinators and an assistant professor of community health sciences at the University of Calgary, dismissed Bishop Henry as “a non-elected official without expertise in evidence-based medicine or public health” and called on the (elected) Catholic school board to disobey the bishop on what was a purely health-related matter.
But Bishop Henry, who said he has deliberately “cultivated” the news media, responded with a column in the Calgary Herald, declaring that his opponents were not “doctors of the soul” and “for Catholics, there is no such thing as a purely ‘health’ issue. All activities proposed for a Catholic school need to be assessed in the light of our faith and doctrine. This is self-evidently necessary in the case of a vaccine against a disease that is transmitted by sexual activity, which impacts not only the physical, but also the spiritual, psychological and moral well-being of an individual.”
Bishop Henry admits there is no evidence that children who are vaccinated against HPV behave differently sexually that those who are not. But he points out in his column that the Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology Canada recommends public education as the best way of combating HPV, with the primary message “that abstinence is the most efficient way to prevent HPV infection.”
The government of Alberta provided a grant for the vaccine in 2007, but Alberta’s eight bishops agreed to oppose the vaccination in the province’s Catholic schools. These schools are wholly funded by taxpayers and governed by elected trustees: The bishops have authority under canon law but not Canadian law, and the Edmonton school trustees went ahead and allowed the vaccinations.
After trying privately for the past year to get the Calgary board to do the same, the group of doctors and other professionals calling themselves HPV Calgary went public in late June to urge the Calgary board to do the same.
But Mary Martin, Calgary board chairman, hasn’t budged. She said “the overarching concern or issue here is that anything we do within our Catholic schools has to be congruent with the teachings of our Church” — and that means “in alignment with the direction of the Alberta bishops.”
John Haas of the Philadelphia-based National Catholic Bioethics Center said, “There is nothing intrinsically immoral in vaccinating for HPV, and it needn’t be seen as promoting promiscuity. Some girls who have led chaste lives may marry someone who has not, by whom they could be infected.”
But the center does take the position that the vaccine should not be forced on children by governments or school systems: “It should be a matter of parental choice.”
Alberta’s Catholic public schools, like those in Saskatchewan and Ontario, are by-products of the 150-year-old compromise between French Catholic Quebec and English Protestant Ontario that created Canada. As such, they are increasingly out of step with Canada’s increasingly aggressive secular culture, which asserts that religion is a private matter best kept out of public policy.
Salt and Light
Bishop Henry has never accepted that view. “We have to be salt and light for society,” he said. And for this reason he has striven to maintain good relations with the media and provide them ready access, even on stories in which the Church does not look good. He has supported strikers, condemned the Iraq War and globalization without drawing much criticism from pundits. Loud have been the complaints, however, when he attacked same-sex “marriage” and homosexuality. His best-known controversy surfaced in 2005, when he issued a pastoral letter on same-sex “marriage” and homosexuality and repeated his comments in a newspaper column. These led to two complaints to the Alberta Human Rights Commission. Bishop Henry stood his ground, and, after three years, both plaintiffs withdrew.
Register correspondent Steve Weatherbe writes from Victoria, British Columbia.
Dan Burke: The Light of God in Nashville, Tennessee
Jimmy Akin: Should We Be Concerned About Pope Francis's Inaugural Mass?
Comments
Post a Comment
I think the HPV vaccine is morally “neutral” but believe parents should have the freedom to decline it for their children.
Does Bishop Henry also oppose the MMR vaccine which is derived from aborted fetal cell lines & is not ethically produced? I find that vacine & others manufactured from aborted children’s cell lines far more troubling.
Here in the United States nobody is forcing anybody to have the HPV Vaccine. It is RECOMMENDED by the CDC for protection against the Human Papilloma virus which studies have found to be a precursor to cervical cancer in women. But is not mandatory to get into school. It would be great if our teenagers waited until they got married to have sex. Unfortunately, that’s not the reality. Many of our teens are sexually active whether we like it or not. While cervical cancer is curable if you catch in time, why expose our daughters to it all. Parents are NOT being forced to immunize their kids either. Most schools will not accept them unless the parents have signed an exemption form with their kids pediatricians and present it to the school office when the kids are registered for school.
“Some girls who have led chaste lives may marry someone who has not, by whom they could be infected.”
-
I’m assuming we are talking high school and younger. Does anybody honestly believe that lots of girls that young are going to have this so they can get married? Yikes. Why not wait until they are engaged? I flat-out refused to have this vaccine.
One other thing: a basic understanding of human psychology is not accessible only to doctors. Risk-compensating behavior is not merely theoretical.
Just to respond to Kathleen’s claim. One baby was used in making the MMR vaccine. The baby was not aborted for the vaccine. Once the cell line was established it keeps growing so they do not keep aborting babies. While the Vatican says using them was wrong at the time, at this point you should still get the vaccine. Measles and rubella kill babies in the womb, cause severe birth defects and more. I would say the Vatican is the gold standard. Sorry if that doesn’t go along with anti-science conspiracy theories.
On another note. While I do not like forcing parents to do a vaccine for HPV I can see the other side. My Dad had a good friend who waited until he was married and did everything right. His wife was sleeping around behind his back and now he is dead from AIDS. Yes waiting is the only way not to get it but sometimes you can be right and someone else can be cheating.
We do the best we can in teaching our children to be chaste before marriage and I still believe in that. But when I was growing up we weren’t exposed to all the garbage that is on TV and the movies which encourage kids to have sex and do what feels good. The problem is that sometimes no matter what we teach our kids, they’re going to ignore us and do what they want when they’re not in our presence. Unfortunately, STDS and teen pregnancies are a reality in the world we live in today. Educating them regarding sex and STDS is not giving them license to be promiscuous.
I find it fascinating that the AMA even approves of the vaccine since too many questions remain. Does it prevent cervical cancer when they’ve never done a long term study or is it assumed because they think certain HPV’s cause cervical cancer? How long does the vaccination last? Does it need a booster? If HPV in a majority of cases goes away on its own, and only a low percentage of girls may not have them go away, why are we wasting tax payer money to vaccinate so many lower income girls at $300 when cervical cancer (if it does in fact cause it) is the most curable form of cancer and can be prevented with a pap smear?
The cost is exhorbitant since you must admit the vaccine is something that makes girls feel safer to choose to have sex. All other vaccines aren’t based on someones choice but this one is so morally God bless this bishop for standing up for chastity. Something the Church has been silent on for 50 years!
I gave my kids the MMR vaccine. I don’t think they started looking to try to get mumps to check it out. Let women die from HPV when there is a prevention. That will teach them to get a virus! A 10 year old getting a shot will probably not make them !@#$%.
Lori, a pap smear doen’t cure anything! It is a test for people with INSURANCE. Obamacare covers it.
Living with Herpes is really hard,? especially when you are a single. According to a report from the largest Herpes singles dating site herpesdateonline.c o m, 98% of its members who used to be on a general dating site to find the love and support were rejected by others. That could be the reason that why herpesdateonline. c o m is so popular and now has more than 600,000 members.
To Lori: The HPV Virus never goes away. The virus manifests itself in tiny little warts on the cervix/penis which is caused by having sexual contact with a person who has been infected. It has been known to cause cervical cancer in women which is curable if caught in it’s early stages by a Pap Smear. Here is an exerpt from the CDC website regarding this vaccine:
“The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommends routine vaccination with GARDASIL for girls ages 11 to 12, and for young women ages 13 through 26 who have not already been vaccinated.
The CDC states that GARDASIL can be given to boys and young men ages 9 through 26, if you and the doctor decide it’s right for your son.” Hope this helps.
This vaccination has been reported to cause serious health defects (Lou Gherig type symptoms, Parkinson symptoms, stroke, etc.)and death in girls. The vaccination does not “protect” against all forms of HPV; only possibly a few. Annual pap smears reveal the HPV and treatment can be done quickly. This vaccination is heavily marketed and is a money making giant for the drug company. BEWARE and do your research!!!
Annnie,
Thanks for your comments.
I’m not against vaccines, only those which are not ethically manufactured.Those include the MMR vaccine currently avilable in the USA & the varicella (chicken pox, shingles) vaccine.
If you do some research on the subject it’s a much darker history than the pharmaceutical companies let on.
Fetal cell lines such as the one used for the rubella component of the MMR were created from an unborn child selected for the live virus. It was from an abortion performed on a mother who’d contracted rubella.
There’s a lot of info online about this.“Children of God for Life” I think is one resource, but you can probably google around.I found this almost immediately:
” The Wistar RA 27/3 strain of rubella virus was isolated in 1964 by Dr. Stanley Plotkin, Wistar
Institute of Anatomy and Biology, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, U.S., from a kidney explant obtained
from a surgically aborted foetus. It was directly inoculated into WI-38 cells, and then attenuated.”
Science is amazing & vaccines are a blessing. They can be created by other means than abortions.However if people do not protest, it only gives a green light for further unethical research including embryonic stem cell, cloning, etc. And if we remain complacent, we give drug manufacturers no incentive to return to previous, ethical production methods.
I just wanted to be sure my memory was correct & then saw these citations online.Multiple abortions resulted in the creation of the rubella component of the current MMR vaccine:
Attenuation Of RA 27/3 Rubella Virus in WI-38 Human Diploid Cells; Amer J Dis Child vol 118 Aug 1969:
“Explant cultures were made of the dissected organs of a particular fetus aborted because of rubella, the 27th in our series of fetuses aborted during the 1964 epidemic. The third explant, which happened to be from kidney, was selected arbitrarily for further study.”
Studies of Immunization With Living Rubella Virus ; Arch J Dis Child vol 110 Oct 1965:
“This fetus was from a 25-year-old mother exposed to rubella 8 days after last menstrual period. 16 days later she developed rubella. The fetus was surgically aborted 17 days after maternal illness and dissected immediately. Explants from several organs were cultured and successful cell growth was achieved from lung, skin, and kidney. It was then grown on WI-38. This new vaccine was tested on orphans in Philadelphia”.
Sorry, one more post.Here’s some good, balanced reasoning from the Pontifical Academy for Life in Rome.
Search for paper on their website:
http://www.academiavita.org
Moral reflections on vaccines prepared from cells derived from aborted human foetuses Text 5 June 2005
.INEFFICACY OF THE HPV VACCINE SEEN BY DOCTOR OF DEEP PERÚ
From its inception until the appearance of cervical carcinoma (UCC), takes on average 20 to 40 years, the research of this vaccine have begun in 2000, it is evident that the scientific efficacy of this new vaccine will be determined the years 2020 – 2040.
HPV not causes definitely the (CCU); at the onset of this disease involves multiple risk factors, including the suspected HPV, but scientificaly is proven by epidemiology and statistics that the sex is what generates this disease .: Mix in 130.000 nuns found not any UCC.
http://www.portalesmedicos.com/publicaciones/articles/1832/1/Epidemiologia-del-carcinoma-del-cuello-uterino.html
To accept that a virus or a bacteria causes a infection disease must unfailingly fulfill the five Koch’s postulate
http://www.xatakaciencia.com/salud/los-postulados-de-koch
1 - The agent must be present in every case of the disease and absent from healthy.
2 - The agent must not appear in other diseases.
3 - The agent to be isolated in pure culture from disease lesions.
4 - The agent of causing disease in a susceptible animal being inoculated.
5 - The agent must again be isolated lesions in experimental animals.
http://es.scribd.com/doc/44558220/MICROBIOLOGIA-1
Consequently, HPV not fulfill not any principle of Koch’s postulate. by not meeting this postulate, that is accepted as dogma in medicine, scientifically we must be ensure that the HPV is not the causative agent to the UCC..
Until October 2012 this vaccine produced only in the United States:278.010 adverse events ( 258.440 females, 12390 males and 7180 unknow sex); permnent disability 9100 (8900 females, 90 males and 110 unknow sex), 1240 deaths (1020 females, 80 males and 140 unknow sex), abnormal PAP 5020, cervical dysplasia 2020 and cervical cancer 570. VAERS say that is denounced between 1% to 10%. This dates is calculated to 10%
http://holyhormones.com/vaccinations/hpv-vaccine/hpv-vaccine-adverse-events-reported-to-vaers/
http://therefusers.com/?s=cervarix
http://www.noticiero.enkoria.com/2011/diez-menores-que-sufrieron-reaccion-adversa-a-la-vacuna-vph-d
http://www.pop.org/content/merck-researcher-admits-gardasil-guards-against-almost-nothing-985
Dr. Harper, who contributed to the development of the vaccine by Merck, reports that the vaccine was not investigated in children under 15 years and the vaccine given to children under 11 years is a big public experiment.
http://offtheradar.co.nz/vaccines/53-researcher-diane-harper-blasts-gardasil-hpv-marketing.html
The vaccine was approved to give girls uncontaminated with HPV, Dr. Howenstinc ensures that the women are vaccinated with HPV contaminated, have the possibility to acquire a 44.6% CCU
http://www.newswithviews.com / Howenstine/james170.htm.
Merck did not disclose that the vaccine was transgenic, the Sane Vax has discovered, which is transgenic because it has been found that the vaccine is contaminated with DNA recombinant vaccine Gardasil (DNArPVH) and has raised its concerns to the president of the FDA Margaret Hamburg. The FDA replied that the vaccine will not cause any damage transgenic
http://real-agenda.com/2011/09/16/vacuna-gardasil-contaminada-con-adn-recombinante-de-vph/
http://bolsonweb.com.ar/diariobolson/detalle.php?id_noticia=26075
A vaccinated child was ill with rheumatoid arthritis, which is an autoimmune disease. 24 hours after vaccination and found that the aluminum adhered to DNArPVH, two years after vaccination and in autopsy 6 months after death in a New Zeland girl Jazmine Renata which had recibed this deadly vaccines
http://www.mecfsforums.com/index.php?topic=9331.0
Management time to get market approval of a drug the FDA is at least three years, it is a drug for cancer 15 years, but the authorization Merck had only six months and the European Medicines Agency (EMA in English) only 9 months: To introduce the vaccine are using the marketing of fear
http://mujeresenaccion.over-blog.es/article-vph-la-vacuna-del-marketing-del-miedo-67210961.ht http://mujeresenaccion.over-blog.es/article-vph-la-vacuna -of-marketing-of-fear-67210961.ht
HPV is ubiquitous; lives in wild and domestic animals, pollute us from birth, is on the doorknobs, on towels, on nails, on fomites, in gloves and specula of gynecologists,. sexual intercourse is not the only means of contamination.
http://spa.myhealthygood.com/cancer-cervical-vacuna-contra-el-vph/investigadores-descubren-el-v
HPV also lives in the 400 nm outermost of our skin and mucous membranes. ,
If you live in our skin, our immune system produces cellular and humoral immunity is acquired or that our body is self vaccinatinge by PVHs living on our skin and mucous ..
http://www.conganat.org/seap/bibliografia/HPVToday/HPVToday007SEAP.pdf
The PVHs is not distributed uniformly worldwide. It has been found that in Canada HPV 18 only reaches 3%; is more often HPV 31, in my country Peru no studies have determined that HPV types predominate; Gardasil contains 225 mcg. aluminum and Cervarix 500 mcg, that produce the Alzheimer, Parkinson and autism, produce too neurotoxic and immune system disorders (Blaylock 2012) and Polisorbato 80, a powerful contraceptive, that in experimental animals produces sterility, atrophy of the testicles and disturbance organic and funtional of the organs of the reproduction; is carcinogenic and mutagenic; also contains sodium borate considered poison unused in medicinal preparations (NLM)
http://www.telefonica.net/web2/paramahamsa/vacunaninosalerta.html http://detenganlavacuna.wordpress.com/2010/11/09/gardasil-cervarix/
Have been discovered to date 200 types of HPV; HPV is not infectious, contagious; the intercourse is not only that the persons is contaminated
http://www.asbmb.org/Webforms.aspx?ekfrm=46
http://quimicaclinicauv.blogspot.com/2006/08/virus-del-papiloma-humano.html http://www-lab.biomedicas.unam.mx/smpv/queeshpv.htm
On 22-11-2010 FDA approved Gardasil for males aged 9 to 26 to prevent warts and cancer to the !@#$%, is overkill and crazy idea
http://real-agenda.com/2011/09/16/vacuna-gardasil-contaminada-con-adn-recombinante-de-vph/
http://salud.aollatino.com/2011/02/02/aprueba-fda-nueva-indicacion-vacuna-tetravalente-vph-eeuu/
For this reasons from deep Peru Huancayo, I believe that this vaccine is a fraud?, robbery?, swindle?, rough joke?.
The HPV is not scientifically proved for the moment that produce the UCC its effectiveness shall be verified just the years of 2020-2040.
Dr. Godofredo Arauzo
E mail: godo.ara@ gmail.com
Post a Comment
By submitting this form, you give The National Catholic Register permission to publish this comment. Comments will be published at our discretion, and may be edited for clarity and length. For best formatting, please limit your response to one paragraph and don't hit "enter" to force line breaks.