A vaccine called Gardasil 9 has been developed that protects against nine HPV types which cause around 90% of cervical cancers in women (and the majority of other HPV-related cancers in women), 95% of all HPV-related cancers in men and 90% of genital warts.
HPV-related cancers include almost all cancers of the cervix, and a proportion of cancers of the anus, vulva, vagina, penis and throat.
Gardasil 9 provides fully vaccinated people with protection against nine types of HPV including:
- types 16 and 18, the two types that cause the majority of HPV-related cancers
- the five next most common HPV types associated with cervical cancer (types 31, 33, 45, 52 and 58)
- two non-cancer-causing HPV types (types 6 and 11), which cause 90% of genital warts.
Gardasil 9 is used in the school-based National HPV Vaccination Program (from 2018). It replaced Gardasil, which protected against four HPV types and was in use between 2007 and 2017.
Australia's Professor Ian Frazer and his team at the University of Queensland discovered how to make the vaccine particles, which form the basis of the HPV vaccine.
More than 270 million doses of HPV vaccines have been administered worldwide (as of May 2017). Over 10 million doses of Gardasil 9 have been given in the US in the past year.
For further information about the vaccines available in Australia, refer to the Australian Immunisation Handbook.