The public health director has questioned a controversial call for teachers to look out for side-effects of the HPV vaccine in students.

Courtenay Heading claims the HPV vaccine is causing adverse effects and wants fully informed consent and a wider debate on the issue.

Each year, all 12-13 year old girls in the Isle of Man are offered the Human Papilloma Virus (HPV) vaccination to help protect them from cervical cancer. It is soon to be extended to boys, too.

But Mr Heading, who organised debates on the issue in the Manx Museum and the Tynwald building this week, has called for teachers to spot signs of side-effects in students who have been given the vaccine.

He says such observed changes could ’typically’ include heavy/irregular periods, severe headaches, ’teenage onset menopause’ and severe muscle pain.

’Let the girls speak freely - prior to pushing the HPV vaccine onto boys on the Isle of Man,’ he said.

But public health director Henrietta Ewart said detailed safety reviews undertaken by regulatory authorities including the World Health Organisation have not found any evidence that the HPV vaccine is linked to an increased risk of any condition including those cited by Mr Heading.

Dr Ewart pointed out that since HPV vaccines were first licensed in 2006, more than 270 million doses have been given worldwide, with over 8.5 million in the UK.

She said: ’When vaccines are given to very large numbers of people, simply by chance some will develop a medical problem around the time of the vaccine.

’This does not mean that the vaccine caused the problem. There is, therefore, currently no indication to recommend any routine clinical monitoring or surveillance post HPV vaccination.’

The UK’s Medical and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) operates a ’yellow card’ system for the reporting of any adverse events felt to be associated with a particular drug or vaccine.

If a girl experiences side effects that she thinks may be due to HPV vaccine, she, her parents or healthcare professional can submit a yellow card.

Reports from the Isle of Man are not fed back to the island’s health department but are included in the aggregate statistics prepared by the MHRA.

Dr Ewart said: ’Teachers would not be expected to have training in the surveillance of health.

’And it is not clear how Mr Heading thinks they are either qualified or in a position to identify girls with menstrual irregularity, "teenage menopause", "severe headache", "severe muscle pain" etc, or to make any judgement on either casual or causal relationship to HPV vaccine.’