What the HPV vaccine actually does inside the body
The vaccine does not treat an existing infection. It trains the immune system to recognise and destroy the human papillomavirus before it can establish itself. Two strains, HPV 16 and HPV 18, cause roughly 70 percent of all cervical cancer cases globally. The quadrivalent vaccine (Gardasil) and the bivalent vaccine (Cervarix) both target these strains. India's domestically produced vaccine, Cervavac, developed by the Serum Institute of Pune, covers the same two high-risk strains and received approval from the Drugs Controller General of India in 2022.
