Mike Freer – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Mike Freer on 2016-02-03.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what progress his Department is making on rolling out HPV vaccinations to men who have sex with men.

Jane Ellison

In November 2015, the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI), the expert body that advises the Government on all immunisation matters, advised that a targeted human papillomavirus vaccination programme should be undertaken for men who have sex with men up to 45 years of age who attend genitourinary medicine and HIV clinics. They noted that this should be subject to procurement of the vaccine and delivery of the programme at a cost-effective price.

JCVI acknowledged that finding a way to implement its advice would be challenging and made clear that work was needed by DH and others to consider commissioning and delivery routes for this programme. This work is already underway and we will announce our plans as soon as we can.