Health Minister Stephen Donnelly said Ireland had achieved its target of reducing cervical cancer rates to four in 100,000 women by 2040, reports RTE.
He said a new action plan outlining Ireland’s next steps to eradicate cancer would be published today, including plans to increase HPV vaccination rates among boys and girls.
Currently, around 300 women are diagnosed with cervical cancer in Ireland each year and around 90 of them die.
The Department of Health said modelling of Irish data, including maintaining vaccination rates for boys and girls against human papillomavirus (HPV) and cervical screening rates, showed Ireland could meet the target within 17 years.
HSE Chief Clinical Officer Dr Colm Henry said: “We have seen a marked decline in the number of people with cervical cancer since the introduction of our cervical screening programme in 2008 and recent research shows the positive impact the HPV vaccine has had in reducing the rate of serious pre-cancer cervical disease. High uptake of our cervical screening and HPV vaccination programmes are essential in making cervical cancer a rare disease,” reports RTE.
The World Health Organization is leading the global initiative to eradicate cancer.
“It is very important that we have a high uptake in both boys and girls because although we know HPV causes cervical cancer it does actually cause other cancers; so penile cancer, anal cancers, and it is associated with some head and neck cancers as well,” speaking on RTÉ’s News at One, Dr Lucy Jessop, Director of the HSE’s National Immunisation Office, reports RTE.
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