Cervical Cancer Deaths Increased Since Vaccine Approval, Then Disappeared During Pandemic

In a recent paper highlighted by the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) highlighted the decline in detected cervical cancer in women, specifically squamous cell carcinoma (SCC).

Such success had been anticipated as the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved the first vaccine to treat the human papillomavirus (HPV) that leads to common types of cervical cancer. Cervical cancer is the second leading cause of cancer death in women aged 20–39 years.

Yet according to the CDC multiple cause mortality data, deaths from cervical cancer—defined as Cervix Uteri, Unspecified - Malignant Neoplasms—have been increasing since the approval of the vaccine.

Then, in 2020, cervical cancer deaths suddenly dropped by half—going from 9,142 in 2019 to 4,765 in 2020 as as if a miracle cure was discovered or the data was flawed.

The steady increase in cervical cancer deaths is also visible on the CDC’s cervical cancer dashboard, although it doesn’t include data for 2020.

According to the dashboard, age-adjusted death rates have been in decline. But CDC mortality data shows little decline in crude death rates by age group—total deaths divided by total population for each age group—particularly compared to how fast rates were declining prior to 2006.

For those 65 and older, the crude death rate had been in stark decline through most of the 2000s, but would level off from 2012 to 2016, ostensibly when the first wave of vaccinated might be protected.

Data from the World Health Organization (WHO) doesn’t have the anomalous drop in 2020, but it does show the increasing prevalence of cervical cancer deaths in recent years similar to CDC data—crude death rate per 100,000 had been declining through around 2004 only to level off.