VICTORIA, Seychelles — Seychelles is widening access to its HPV Catch-Up Vaccination Campaign to include boys and men who missed the jab when it was first offered to boys in 2024, and expatriate men up to the age of 45, the Ministry of Health has announced. The extension, which runs until December 2026, brings the country’s immunisation policy closer to the World Health Organisation’s push to eliminate cervical cancer as a public health threat.
The first phase of the catch-up, which began in September 2025, had focused on girls and women who missed one or both doses of the HPV vaccine since it was introduced for schoolgirls in 2014, and on women up to 45. The widened campaign now covers three additional groups: boys and men who did not receive the vaccine through the school programme, individuals who started but did not finish the recommended schedule, and expatriate men and women with a valid GOP document.
Eligible individuals will receive a two-dose course, given six months apart. Health authorities have stressed that the campaign is not just about catching up missed doses for younger people: adults aged 27 to 45 can also benefit, because vaccination still protects against the specific HPV types they have not yet been exposed to.
Seychelles has a strong track record in HPV immunisation. The country first introduced the vaccine for girls in 2014 through the School Health Programme and extended it to boys ten years later, in 2024. The move brought the country into line with the WHO recommendation that both sexes be vaccinated, given that HPV is responsible not only for cervical cancer but also for anal, penile, vaginal, vulvar, oral, head and neck cancers, and for genital warts in both men and women.
Cervical cancer remains one of the most common cancers affecting Seychellois women. According to figures released by the Ministry of Health, 40 women died of cervical cancer between 2019 and 2024, including women at a young age. The expanded campaign is designed to close the immunity gaps left by incomplete coverage in earlier years, and to bring down that toll over the coming decade.
The expansion is also a practical step in support of the WHO Cervical Cancer Elimination Initiative, which calls on all countries to vaccinate at least 90 percent of girls against HPV by the age of 15, to screen 70 percent of women by 35 and again by 45, and to treat 90 percent of identified cervical disease. The strategy sits alongside other global guidance from health bodies, including the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention HPV vaccine programme, which has tracked the real-world impact of HPV vaccination in reducing cervical pre-cancers since the vaccine was first licensed in 2006.
The vaccine is free of charge in Seychelles and is being offered at community health centres across Mahé, Praslin, La Digue and at the Youth Health Centre in Victoria, alongside the Communicable Disease Control Unit’s Yellow Roof Building clinic. The ministry has encouraged residents to contact their nearest centre to confirm availability and to book appointments.
Public health messaging around the campaign focuses on five points: that the vaccine is safe and effective, that it can still help sexually active adults, that it prevents new HPV infections but does not treat existing ones, that women should keep attending cervical cancer screening regardless of vaccination status, and that completing both doses is essential for full protection.
The expansion is part of a broader effort to reduce the burden of preventable cancers in Seychelles, where the small population means each avoidable death is felt across families and communities. By widening the campaign to boys, to men in their thirties and forties, and to expatriates, the ministry is taking a deliberate step towards the kind of population-wide protection that has driven steep declines in HPV-related disease in countries such as Australia, Sweden and the United Kingdom.
Sources cited: WHO Cervical Cancer Elimination Initiative. CDC HPV vaccines overview. CDC HPV vaccine for parents.
Source: SN
