In the US, for instance, religious groups are gearing up to oppose vaccination, despite a survey showing 80 per cent of parents favour vaccinating their daughters. “Abstinence is the best way to prevent HPV,” says Bridget Maher of the Family Research Council, a leading Christian lobby group that has made much of the fact that, because it can spread by skin contact, condoms are not as effective against HPV as they are against other viruses such as HIV.
“Giving the HPV vaccine to young women could be potentially harmful, because they may see it as a licence to engage in premarital sex,” Maher claims, though it is arguable how many young women have even heard of the virus. link
I don’t really have a lot of comment about this, susanbhu said the other day that people might not like living in a theocracy as much as some who currently want one might think.
I think she is right about that.
I guess the other big question has to do with women in the US – to what extent is their oppression sufficiently internalized?
Just how far are American women willing to go along to get along in the interest of pragmatism?