I’m a doctor, and here’s the truth anti-HPV vaxxers don’t want you to hear in Pakistan

Pakistan has finally rolled out the HPV vaccine this week, joining over 150 countries who have chosen to add protection against cervical cancer to their national immunization programs.
While the campaign has been less than perfect, with awareness about both cervical cancer and the role of HPV vaccine in its prevention very, very low, the loudest voices are not of those who are seeking clarity or asking for more information, but of those who are sowing the seeds of doubt.
Much of the resistance is coming in the shape of two tactics that we are very familiar with in the vaccine world: whataboutism and cherry-picking
The truth is that vaccines are the greatest gift of science to humanity, and Pakistan has kept pace, almost, with most of the modern vaccines used in far more well-resourced countries. This is a joint effort of our governments and partners, including the Global Alliance for Vaccine Initiative (GAVI), who help secure extremely subsidized rates of the vaccines to the government in the very large quantities that are required.
But trust is fragile and a lack of it expands the space where there is a lack of information, the same way it is doing here in Pakistan. It is the same space where misinformation and disinformation (fake news) thrives.
A historical backdrop of suspicion, amplified by social media, makes it easy for falsehoods to travel faster than facts. When trust in institutions is already thin, every rumor finds an audience.
So, what about whataboutism? It is the art of deflection. Faced with the evidence that HPV vaccination can save lives, critics respond with questions meant to derail the conversation: “What about polio? Wasn’t that controversial?” or “What about breast cancer? Isn’t that more common?” These diversions do not address the specific purpose of the HPV vaccination to protect girls from a virus that causes cervical cancer. Instead, they succeed in muddying the waters, leaving parents unsure and hesitant.
Cherry-picking works differently but is equally effective. A few episodes of fainting (usually a harmless adolescent response to an injection) or a rumor of infertility is repeated endlessly as if they prove the case. Meanwhile, decades of data showing millions safely vaccinated worldwide are ignored. Fear spreads through fragments, WhatsApp messages and TikToks, not facts.
Why do we need protection against a cancer that kills “only” 3,000 women a year, when more die of diphtheria or tetanus? Why vaccinate when we do not have HPV screening? Such questions are being asked with a tone of dismissal, as though three thousand deaths are insignificant. The reality is that these are not just numbers. They are mothers, wives and daughters, often in the prime of their lives, cut short by a disease that is almost 100% preventable with only one shot. Many more live in abject misery and stigma that comes from a cancer of the reproductive tract. The shame and silence around cervical cancer means that women present late, when treatment is less effective, more painful, unavailable or expensive. Dismissing this because the annual death toll seems small is to overlook the compounding loss of children left without mothers, families driven into poverty by the cost of care and the untold suffering of women who never make it into the statistics.
Our surveillance records show the highest coverage of the DPT containing vaccines this year, at 87% (Source: WHO). There are 21 recorded cases of diphtheria deaths this year (source: FDI), and 28 deaths from neonatal tetanus. Islamabad has eliminated maternal neonatal tetanus (source: UNICEF). That in itself is the sharpest response to the whataboutism that pits one preventable disease against another.
That is why the HPV rollout cannot be treated as just another line item in the immunization program. It requires deliberate investment in communication, not only to provide facts but to explain how misinformation works. Parents need to see how whataboutism distracts and cherry-picking distorts.
We need to explain that fainting after a jab is common in adolescence, not a marker of danger. We need to emphasize that decades of global evidence, across continent and cultures, affirms the vaccine’s safety and effectiveness. And we need to remind ourselves that cervical cancer is not just someone else’s problem: it is ours, right now.
Every successful vaccination campaign in Pakistan has shown that supply alone does not build confidence. Trust is built in classrooms in clinics and living rooms and on WhatsApp groups. It is built by answering questions patiently, and by calling out misinformation for what it is: a distraction and a distortion.
The HPV vaccine gives us a rare opportunity to prevent cancer before it begins. We should not squander that opportunity because of noise and doubt, it would be a tragedy. The louder we let whataboutism and cherry-picking speak, the more lives will be left unprotected.
In the end, the case is simple. If we have the means to prevent thousands of women from dying every year, why wouldn’t we?

The writer is the Chair of Paediatrics & Child Health at Aga Khan University, Karachi, Pakistan