Pre-teen Italian girls will soon be vaccinated against a sexually transmitted virus responsible for most cases of cervical cancer, Health Minister Livia Turco said on Wednesday.
The minister said all 12-year-old girls would be called up to receive the jab against the human papillomavirus (HPV) once the vaccine is approved by the Italian drug authorities.
The vaccine would be given free to the 280,000 girls concerned, Turco said.
She stressed that HPV was linked to 70% of cervical cancer cases and that it was important to protect girls before they entered a sexually active age.
HPV is extremely common - more than 50% of sexually active men and women will be infected at some point in their lives.
Most HPV infections do not cause any symptoms and go away on their own but some eventually lead to cervical cancer in women.
The vaccine, which was approved in the United States in June, involves a course of three jabs given over six months.
The Italian drug agency AIFA is expected to approve the jab next month. Turco said that the scientific research had shown that the vaccine was "safe, well tolerated and capable of preventing almost all cases of HPV infection".
She said women up to the age of 26 would also be encouraged to receive the vaccine.
Researchers stress that the vaccine, made by Merck & Co and called Gardasil, is more effective when given to girls and women who have not yet been exposed to the HPV virus.
Turco said that screening through regular pap tests remained the best course of prevention for older women and those who have already had an HPV infection.
She said the cost of vaccinating all 12-year-olds would cost the health service 75 million euros annually and that it would be the first free anti-HPV vaccination programme in Europe. Some 1,700 women die from cervical cancer in Italy every year and a further 3,500 are diagnosed with it.
Worldwide, more than 470,000 women are diagnosed annually with the cancer and 230,000 die from it.
Several leading pharmaceutical companies are developing cervical cancer vaccines to rival Gardasil, including GlaxoSmithKline.
