Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 27 July 2021
3262. Deputy Holly Cairns asked the Minister for Health the steps he is taking to fulfil the Programme for Government commitment to support the CervicalCheck screening programme and promote the uptake of the HPV vaccine. [41104/21]
View answerThe Programme for Government commits to supporting the CervicalCheck Screening Programme and promoting the uptake of the HPV vaccine. To achieve this requires a well organised screening programme, combined with HPV vaccination for boys and girls, so that Ireland can look forward to a significant reduction in the incidence of cervical cancer cases over the next 10-20 years.
The Programme for Government commits to fully implement the recommendations contained in Dr Scally’s Report of the Scoping Inquiry, and all other reports into CervicalCheck. In this regard, significant progress has been made in implementing the recommendations and associated actions from Dr Scally's report, across all themes and areas of work, by the Department of Health, the HSE and the National Cancer Registry Ireland. In addition, the CervicalCheck Steering Committee, chaired by Professor Anne Scott, and which includes representatives from 221+ Group and patient advocates in its membership have a role in oversight of the implementation of the remaining recommendations. At the end of Quarter 2 2021, 164 of the 170 actions, arising from 58 recommendations, are completed. Work is well underway in completing the 6 remaining actions. Since Quarter 1 2019, the Department of Health has been publishing quarterly progress reports on the implementation of the recommendations made in Dr Scally’s 2018 report and the full archive and previous quarterly progress reports is available on the Department of Health website. The Government approved €10 million in funding for Cancer Screening in 2021, this investment represents a real commitment to improving healthcare for the women of Ireland. Details of the specific service improvements and investments are set out in the HSE National Service Plan 2021.
In 2009, the National Immunisation Advisory Committee (NIAC) recommended HPV (human papillomavirus) vaccination for all 12 to 13 year old girls to reduce their risk of developing cervical cancer when they are adults. In September 2010, the HPV vaccination programme was introduced for all girls in the first year of secondary school. The NIAC recommended that the HPV vaccine should also be given to boys. On foot of NIAC’s recommendation, my Department asked the Health Information and Quality Authority (HIQA) to undertake a health technology assessment (HTA) to establish the clinical and cost-effectiveness of extending the current immunisation programme to include boys in the first year of secondary school. HIQA completed the HTA in December 2018, recommending that the HPV immunisation programme be extended to include boys. A policy decision was made to extend the HPV immunisation programme to include boys. This started in September 2019 with the introduction of a 9-valent HPV vaccine.
It is important to note that the schools-based immunisation programme for the 2019/2020 academic year has been completed and the uptake rates for the HPV vaccine in that academic year are 82% for the first dose of the vaccine and 77% for the second dose. This is the highest uptake for the HPV vaccination programme since 2015/2016 and is particularly encouraging because it was the first year that boys were included in the programme and it shows that the provision of vaccine in community clinics did not adversely affect the uptake.
The programme for the academic year 2020/2021 was paused during the first few months of 2021 due to school closures and redeployment of staff to the COVID-19 immunisation programme. The inputting of uptake information for the schools-based programme has also been delayed due to redeployment of administrative staff. However, Community Healthcare Organisations have reported that the vast majority of second level schools had their first dose of HPV vaccine delivered between October and December 2020.
The uptake rate for the first dose of the HPV vaccine, in the 2020/2021 academic year, is 67% as of the 12th May 2021, and this figure is expected to increase because data input on vaccine uptake is ongoing. The HSE expects the HPV vaccination programme for 2020/21 to be substantially complete before the start of the 2021/22 academic year.
