Book those behind AP girls’ death: Left
4 were given cervical cancer vaccine
Following the deaths of four Andhra tribal girls who were administered a vaccine against cervical cancer, the Left on Monday asked Union Health Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad to find out and punish the people responsible for those deaths.
Since 2007, international non-governmental organisation PATH in collaboration with the Indian Council of Medical Research and two state governments is conducting trials to find out the usefulness of the vaccines against human papilloma virus as a public health intervention to reduce cervical cancer prevalence.
Within five years, the project sought to vaccinate 32,000 girls of 10-14 years in Khammam in Andhra Pradesh and Vadodara in Gujarat districts to generate crucial information which in the long run may led to cost-effective strategies for public sector HPV immunisation programmes. In Khamman the vaccination began on August 19, 2009. The first shot was followed by two more dosages in October and January. Almost 14,000 were vaccinated but four girls died since August.
“This constitutes shocking criminal negligence on the part of the authorities to permit such a large programme outside the public health service system,” CPM MP Brinda Karat wrote in a letter to Azad on Monday.
The vaccinators claimed they obtained information consent from tribal girls before the shots. But Left activists said there was virtually no pre-information or campaign before the actual vaccination and nobody knows what actually could have been explained to the girls in the name of informed consent.
“Why were mainly tribal children chosen? What is the quality of “informed consent? Tribal children cannot be the means for MNCs to promote their vaccines,” said Karat.
The HPV vaccines — incidentally approved by the Centre for commercial use in India — were donated by the manufacturers — MSD and GSK.
“Soon after the vaccination, ICMR team visited those girls. There were no adverse reaction. We are now conducting a review and should not jump the gun,” ICMR director general V M Katoch told Deccan Herald.
Karat, on the other hand, felt that why such programmes should not take place outside the public health system.
DH News Service
