Christian Conservatives Oppose Pap Vaccine Which May Prevent Cancer

There's great news for women: Merck's new HPV vaccine, Gardasil, has been shown to be 100% effective in preventing the two most common strains of HPV, the human papilloma virus, which is known to cause cervical cancer. These two strains are thought to be responsible for about 70% of cervical cancer cases. Cervical cancer kills an estimated 300,000 women per year, 4,000 of those in the United States. Merck hopes to improve the vaccine to make it effective against up to 87% of cervical cancer cases.
To be fully effective, the vaccine must be given to girls and women before they become sexually active (or at least before they are ever exposed to HPV).
To all reasonable people, this is fantastic news. Reducing cervical canecr rates by 87% ( or even just 70%) is phenomenal. We live in a world full of unreasonable people, however, and some actually oppose this breakthrough preventative measure.
For example, Abstinence & Marriage Education Partnership executive director Scott Phelps complains [bugmenot], "Sexually transmitted diseases in the United States will not be contained by injecting vaccines into pre-adolescents in anticipation of promiscuous behavior." It doesn't take a microbiologist to spot the problems in Phelps's statement. First, it's certainly possible to contract HPV without promiscuous behaviour. Many people carry HPV without even knowing it. Infants can be born carrying HPV. Secondly, this statement is provably false. Maybe Phelps doesn't understand what "100% effective vaccine" means, but it will, by definition, necessarily contain at least these two strains of HPV if it is administered. Such is the nature of a vaccine.
The Family Research Council is concerned that vaccinating against HPV might encourage kids to have sex. This is probably a legitimate concern-- I know that when I got a tetanus vaccine, the first thing I wanted to do was to run out and play on rusty manure-spreading farm equipment in an effort to get as many puncture wounds as possible. The FRC position presumes that sex is dirty and wrong; after all, you didn't see them complaining about the relatively new chicken pox or flu vaccines.