stone the harlots

Women who fornicate deserve to die.

So say the religious nutjobs at the Family Research Council (FRC) . The message: It's better to let millions die rather than do anything that might lead to fornication, and cancer isn't all that bad if it keeps people chaste.

The facts:

1. Cervical cancer kills lots of women each year worldwide.
2. It is among the most deadly forms of cancer because it is usually detected at an advanced (and therefore untreatable) stage.
3. It is caused by certain strains of the sexually transmitted Human Papilloma Virus (HPV).
4. HPV has infected "half of all sexually active women between 18 and 22 in the US."
5. There's now a vaccine to prevent HPV.

Deaths from cervical cancer could jump fourfold to a million a year by 2050, mainly in developing countries. This could be prevented by soon-to-be-approved vaccines against the virus that causes most cases of cervical cancer - but there are signs that opposition to the vaccines might lead to many preventable deaths.

In the US, for instance, religious groups are gearing up to oppose vaccination, despite a survey showing 80 per cent of parents favour vaccinating their daughters. “Abstinence is the best way to prevent HPV,” says Bridget Maher of the Family Research Council (FRC), a leading Christian lobby group that has made much of the fact that, because it can spread by skin contact, condoms are not as effective against HPV as they are against other viruses such as HIV.

“Giving the HPV vaccine to young women could be potentially harmful, because they may see it as a licence to engage in premarital sex,” Maher claims, though it is arguable how many young women have even heard of the virus.

You have got to be kidding.

Let me get this straight — apparently, getting cervical cancer is the least of your problems, because if you got it through fornication, you're going to hell anyhow. I guess the wages of sin really are death. But what about virgins or faithful women who get HPV from their no-good (but promiscuous) husbands? Do they deserve the same fate as the harlots who engaged in premarital sex?

And does the FRC oppose treatments for other STDs? Eugene Volokh observes:

The availability of antibiotic treatment for syphilis, gonorrhea, and other bacterial sexually transmitted diseases similarly decreases the cost of sex, and may thus increase people's tendency to engage in sex.

Would the FRC urge that people not be offered treatment for these diseases?

Personally, I'm a fan of both vaccines and premarital sex. I've had a lot of both over the years and I think I'm better for the experience.

If the Family Research Council opposes one or both, they should feel free to encourage people to avoid them But if they want to discourage the development and availability of vaccines because they'd rather see people live in fear of avoidable diseases, then they're not going to have much room to complain when people accuse them of wanting to turn back the clock -- and of being motivated more by opposition to sex than by support for families.

Via DDTB and Eugene Volokh