Birmingham teenagers at risk as thousands miss out on cancer jab

Sep 21 2009 by Alison Dayani, Birmingham Mail

THE numbers of girls in Birmingham being vaccinated with the life-saving cervical cancer jab are among the worst in the country, with only a third of teenagers being protected in city suburbs.

Latest NHS figures reveal health chiefs in Birmingham are failing to make sure enough schoolgirls have the HPV vaccine, which will stop them dying from the same disease that killed 27-year-old TV personality Jade Goody (pictured left).

Dismally low results were recorded by Heart of Birmingham Primary Care Trust (PCT) along with Birmingham East and North PCT, which chose to not giving the injection in schools like other areas, but at GP surgeries instead.

Only 31 per cent or less of 12 to 13-year-olds were fully protected with all three doses of the jab in East and North, while there was no record of girls having all three vaccines in Heart of Birmingham and only 52 per cent had received the first two doses.

South Birmingham PCT had high uptakes for the first two doses, but only 59 per cent of girls had received all three.

This compares to 70 per cent of schoolgirls vaccinated nationally and uptakes in the high 80 and 90 per cents across Sandwell, Dudley, Worcestershire and Solihull, in details disclosed today by the NHS Information Centre.