The health minister is to go ahead with plans to make vaccines against cervical cancer available to all girls over 12 years old from next September, despite confirmation that there were ‘connections’ between the healthcare council which recommended the policy and the drugs industry, reports the NRC.

A tv programme recently revealed that the healthcare council received research funds from the drugs industry and this was later confirmed by the council’s professor Van Noordaa, says the paper.
However, Van Noordaa said the integrity of the healthcare council was not in question and that the its decisions were made independently.
Labour MP Khadija Arib, who had asked the minister for an explanation in the affair, told the paper she is satisfied with the answer but still wants a parliamentary debate on the role of pharmaceutical firms in drawing up recommendations for the health sector.