Grace Burns

But for anyone who is 50 and over, it is recommended that you consider a booster of diphtheria tetanus hoping cough.

And a lot of people go away, Norman, and I see them just before they're going away to Thailand or Indonesia, countries where diphtheria is circulating.

It is so worthwhile considering a booster dose.

It's about $35 to $50, depending on where you get it.

Yes, against human papillomavirus in boys.

So this is a study that's been published in JAMA Oncology, done by researchers from Japan, asking the question, does that nine-valent HPV vaccine, that's what we use here in Australia on the schedule.

Yes, nine strains.

Does it lower the risk of HPV-related cancers in adolescent boys and young men?

And we're talking about head and neck cancers, penile, esophageal and anal cancers.

HPV is associated with all of them.

And just to link it again, just to really make the connection, Norman, HPV is what causes most cervical cancers too.

So initially it was girls.

Some countries still only vaccinate girls.

But really, as you say, the benefit is in vaccinating everybody.

And it appears now that everybody yields benefit because what this study found is that in the group who were vaccinated, there was a 46% lower risk of these HPV-related cancers.

But the authors did say that they need longer term data because a lot of this stuff has a very long tail in terms of HPV exposure and then it's sitting around there for years and causing, you know, the cells to change.

So this is wonderful and I think this really makes the case for vaccinating boys and girls, but that some more longer term data would be even better.

We don't have a sound.

A bit of context here.

There are some GLP-1s like Ozempic which are on the PBS, which if you have type 2 diabetes, yes, you can get it at a subsidised price.