HPV Vaccination: Toward the Elimination of Cervical Cancer in the Caribbean Countries. Virtual Meeting Report, 22–23 and 29–30 October 2020

Abstract

In October 2020, 30 participants and 14 panelists from the ministries of health from the Caribbean subregion, the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO), the World Health Organization, and various other institutions took part in a meeting on human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccination to end cervical cancer in the Caribbean countries. PAHO organized the meeting as a virtual event. This PAHO publication is the report of that meeting, whose sessions discussed strategies and shared experiences with the objective of eliminating cervical cancer in the Region of the Americas. Following the sequence of the sessions, the publication summarizes the speakers’ presentations and the subsequent discussions. The sessions focused on four main areas: updates on strategies for the regional and global elimination of cervical cancer: screening and treatment of cervical cancer; HPV vaccination; and impact of the HPV vaccine. The publication closes with the meeting’s closing considerations, which ranged from the importance of a collaborative approach and high vaccine coverage to considerations on COVID-19 and launch of the Global Strategy to Accelerate the Elimination of Cervical Cancer as a Public Health Problem.