Indonesia targeting 90% children vaccinated against HPV by 2030

Jakarta (ANTARA) – The Indonesian government is targeting the human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccination coverage among girls and boys to reach 90 percent by 2030, an official from the Ministry of Health said.”The goal is for at least 90 percent of girls and boys in the country to be vaccinated against HPV before the age of 15 by 2030,” the ministry’s Director of Immunization, Prima Yosephine, said here on Monday.This, she continued, is a strategy to accelerate the elimination of HPV transmission, which causes cervical cancer.In the immunization regime, the government is administering a single dose of vaccine to all girls in the 5th grade of primary school, or those aged 11, with the same approach applying to children not attending school.If a child misses the immunization at age 11, it can be caught up in the 6th grade of elementary school, or in the 9th grade of junior high school, or when they turn 15.The immunization program will also target school-age boys starting in 2026, with the same dose as girls: a single shot at age 11 or in the 5th grade.This strategy will be implemented in phases, beginning next year in 3 provinces first and gradually rolling out across the rest of Indonesia.According to Yosephine, cervical cancer places a heavy health burden on Indonesia, with approximately 36,000 new cases recorded annually, and nearly 60 percent of these cases result in death.The challenge in eliminating cervical cancer, she pointed out, is the low public awareness regarding accessing early screening and utilizing the government-provided HPV vaccination, even among those who know the risks of the cancer or have witnessed it affecting their closest ones.She affirmed that in an effort to eliminate cervical cancer, the government is also pursuing a target of at least 75 percent of women aged 30 to 60 to have undergone screening through an HPV DNA test.Additionally, the government plans to expand HPV immunization to include women up to age 20 in 2027 and targets that 90 percent of women diagnosed with cervical cancer can immediately receive adequate treatment by 2030.