Assemblywoman Sally Lieber is proposing legislation that would prohibit schools from admitting female students into the 6th grade unless the girl has received the human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine. Remember, Lieber is the same legislator who is grabbing headlines these days with her spanking legislation.
This HPV vaccine push is coming from the Planned Parenthood types who believe that most children become sexually active around 11 or 12. Certainly, there are those children who do starting having sex that young–but they are not the mainstream. Moreover, even if they are, we do not need the schools to be requiring this vaccine. This should be between the student, her parent(s) and her physician.
I’m sure that Lieber and others will argue that it is the norm to have schools require students be vaccinated, but these vaccines are generally for highly communicable diseases that have posed major threats to the public health in the past. That cannot be said of HPV. According to the CDC, HPV is a group of viruses that includes more than 100 different strains or types, of which more than 30 are sexually transmitted. HPV can be linked to cervical cancer and therefore, the public health community wants to see every young girl vaccinated. But they don’t want to leave it to their parents to decide when the vaccine should be given. Nope, it’s got to be in the government’s hands, which of course, ends up putting another mandate on the schools.
How about if we just let the schools worry about whether the 6th grade girl they may be admitting CAN READ? Let us parents, in conjunction with our pediatricians, decide when the HPV vaccine needs to be given.
I have a sixth grade girl. She can’t stand boys. I know that will change, but government shouldn’t make me rush her into a deep discussion of sexuality and sexual activity before my daughter is developmentally ready.
I know that the public health types will sniff at that and tell themselves that my daughter is probably secretly having sex and I, like most parents, am clueless. That’s the problem with trying to legislate every aspect of our life. A law doesn’t know that I am an active parent. I know where my daughter is and who she is with at all times right now. I know that she prefers books to boys. Again, that will change, but right now, she doesn’t need–or want–a long lecture on STDs and cervical cancer.
Like most parents, I know better than Sally Lieber, better than the public health wonks at DHS and better than Planned Parenthood activists what my daughter needs. Government should leave this matter to parents and their pediatricians. I hope this bill doesn’t make it out of committee, much less both houses. If it does, it deserves to be vetoed.