Calgary Catholic School Board members after taking a vote Wednesday night have decided not to offer the controversial Human Papillomavirus Vaccine (HPV) to Grade 5 girls, since offering it would make it appear that they were condoning pre-marital sex.

South Edmonton St. Thomas Aquinas School Board with 2,500 students has also refused the vaccine, after trustees voted 6-3 against the vaccine at a special board meeting.

The Calgary Catholic School District, the largest in Alberta serves 44,000 students in Calgary, Airdrie, Cochrane, Chestermere and Rocky View.

Both boards have decided to let parents make the decision for their daughters and will only provide them with information as to where the vaccine can be obtained.  While, the Calgary Health Region charges adult women $450 for the vaccine, it is being provided free of cost to girls still in school.

However, Howard May, a spokesman for Alberta Health says that new avenues are being explored to make the vaccine available to girls in the Catholic school system, as health is the issue, with 40-women in Alberta dying each year from cervical cancer.

As schools reopen this month, health regions across Alberta prepare to offer free, voluntary HPV vaccination campaigns for girls entering Grade 5, a programme that will be expanded to include Grade 9 girls as soon as September 2009.  Girls whose parents have consented to their immunization, will be administered a series of three shots by public health nurses.

The second most common type of cancer in women aged 20 – 44, every year 1,300-Canadian women contract the sexually transmitted virus responsible for causing cervical cancer annually, and 400-women die of it every year.

An Alberta Health statement confirms the vaccine is safe and effective, if given early, and can prevent 70% of cervical cancers by targeting four strains of HPV.