In a call for action, a coalition of statewide organizations led by the UAB Comprehensive Cancer Center is urging parents and health care providers to get children vaccinated for the human papillomavirus.

Institutions participating are: the Alabama Department of Public Health, the University of South Alabama Mitchell Cancer Institute, Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Alabama, VIVA Health, Mid-South Division of the American Cancer Society, Alabama Chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics, and the Alabama Academy of Family Physicians.

Alabama ranks among 10 states with the lowest HPV vaccination rates in the nation. In 2014, data from the Alabama Department of Public Health showed there are significantly low rates of HPV vaccination among teens living in Alabama. Only 39 percent of adolescent girls in Alabama between 13 and 17 years old have received all three doses of the HPV vaccine, and only nine percent of adolescent boys in Alabama have received the vaccine.

The HPV vaccine is important because it protects against cancers caused by HPV infection, which includes cervical, vaginal and vulvar cancers in women and penile cancer in men, as well as anal cancer, cancer of the back of the throat, and genital warts in both men and women.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the HPV vaccine is recommended for preteen boys and girls at age 11 or 12 so they are protected before ever being exposed to the virus. But vaccination can start as early as nine years of age. The vaccine is given in a series of three shots over a six-month period.

"There is no question that the vaccine works," said Warner Huh, MD, director of the UAB Division of Gynecologic Oncology. "Now, we have a second-generation vaccine that protects against 90 percent of the HPV viruses that cause cervical cancer. This vaccine can literally eradicate the majority of cervical cancer, if given widely and appropriately."