2008 Woodie Awards
Guard up on Gardasil
Caitlin Smith, LeeAnn Maton, Nicole Charky and Tim Bloomquist
Issue date: 10/3/07 Section: News
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Reported adverse effects, including death, have raised debate over the safety of the human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine Gardasil, which was released in June 2006.
Judicial Watch, a public interest association, filed a request in May 2007 to retrieve reports on Gardasil from the Vaccine Adverse Events Reporting System (VAERS), a cooperative analysis program between the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the Centers for Disease Control (CDC). Of the 1,637 adverse reports, the FDA considered 136 of them serious. Thirteen instances of Guillain-Barré Syndrome, a disorder in which the body's immune system attacks part of the peripheral nervous system, surfaced amongst Gardasil recipients. Seven females were hospitalized, one suffered a seizure and another from brain hemorrhaging. Five patients received other vaccines simultaneously with Gardasil.
The FDA-approved Gardasil, created and distributed by Merck & Co., is marketed as a vaccine to reduce the prevalence of cervical cancer in the U.S. Every year, 11,000 people are diagnosed with cervical cancer and 3,700 people die. The traditional side effects of the vaccine are fainting and fever.
According to the CDC, four fatalities occurred near the time of the patients' Gardasil injections. One patient died three hours after receiving the Gardasil vaccination; blood clotting was listed as the cause of death.
A 12-year-old was co-vaccinated with Gardasil and a vaccine targeting Hepatitis A on March 1, 2007, and died six days later. The autopsy revealed myocarditis (inflammation of the heart muscle) as the cause of death. The girl had a prior history of complications in the aortic valve.
Merck's Web site states, "Co-administration of Gardasil with other vaccines has not been studied."
On March 6, a 14-year-old patient was hospitalized for pneumonia four days after receiving her second dose of Gardasil. The patient died of multi-organ system failure due to Influenza B.
A 19-year-old woman began convulsing while exercising on a playing field. She was vaccinated on March 12, 2007, and died on March 26, 2007, from a pulmonary embolism - a block in the lung from a blood clot. The woman took oral contraceptives in conjunction with receiving the Gardasil vaccinations.
Judicial Watch, a public interest association, filed a request in May 2007 to retrieve reports on Gardasil from the Vaccine Adverse Events Reporting System (VAERS), a cooperative analysis program between the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the Centers for Disease Control (CDC). Of the 1,637 adverse reports, the FDA considered 136 of them serious. Thirteen instances of Guillain-Barré Syndrome, a disorder in which the body's immune system attacks part of the peripheral nervous system, surfaced amongst Gardasil recipients. Seven females were hospitalized, one suffered a seizure and another from brain hemorrhaging. Five patients received other vaccines simultaneously with Gardasil.
The FDA-approved Gardasil, created and distributed by Merck & Co., is marketed as a vaccine to reduce the prevalence of cervical cancer in the U.S. Every year, 11,000 people are diagnosed with cervical cancer and 3,700 people die. The traditional side effects of the vaccine are fainting and fever.
According to the CDC, four fatalities occurred near the time of the patients' Gardasil injections. One patient died three hours after receiving the Gardasil vaccination; blood clotting was listed as the cause of death.
A 12-year-old was co-vaccinated with Gardasil and a vaccine targeting Hepatitis A on March 1, 2007, and died six days later. The autopsy revealed myocarditis (inflammation of the heart muscle) as the cause of death. The girl had a prior history of complications in the aortic valve.
Merck's Web site states, "Co-administration of Gardasil with other vaccines has not been studied."
On March 6, a 14-year-old patient was hospitalized for pneumonia four days after receiving her second dose of Gardasil. The patient died of multi-organ system failure due to Influenza B.
A 19-year-old woman began convulsing while exercising on a playing field. She was vaccinated on March 12, 2007, and died on March 26, 2007, from a pulmonary embolism - a block in the lung from a blood clot. The woman took oral contraceptives in conjunction with receiving the Gardasil vaccinations.