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Law, ethics and medicine
Who calls the shots? The ethics of adolescentself-consent for HPV vaccination
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  • Published on: 26 February 2018
    I'm so glad I practice in the UK, not USA!
    • Peter M English, Public Health Physician N/A - this is a personal response

    I was intrigued to read this article about US practice relating to consent and minors.

    Intrigued; and very pleased that I practice in the UK, where this was agreed, very sensibly, years ago.

    The UK law permits a minor to consent to treatment, as long as they are capable of understanding the issues involved. And for vaccination, the issues (when you leave out the non-science-based scary stuff) are usually straightforward.

    This means that vaccinating adolescents against HPV is straightforward - a few simple questions to establish that they understand what the vaccines for, and have an acceptable understanding of the almost-negligible risks involved, and you can vaccinate them, without requiring parental consent and with the full support of healthcare systems and the courts.

    The ludicrous situation in the USA where some parents can prevent their children from accessing vaccines at the right time (before sexual debut), when the children themselves have a clearer understanding of the issues than their parents and want to be vaccinated is now, thankfully, a largely historical issue here.

    Conflict of Interest:
    None declared.

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