'I'd rather see my daughter die than have sex'

Merck and GlaxoSmithKline have created a cervical cancer vaccine. Merck's drug seems to be 100% effective--it kills the strain of the virus that causes cervical cancer. Risks seem minimal. So the pharmaceutical companies and some public health advocates have come to a reasonable conclusion: Girls should be inoculated with the vaccine.

The Family Research Council and other Religious Right groups oppose any vaccination. Why? Because women usually get the human papilloma virus (HPV)--the virus that causes cervical cancer--from sex.

Here's their logic: Virgins don't get cervical cancer. To give girls the vaccine is to discourage their church's abstinence campaign. It is, bluntly, to "encourage" sex.

Here's the flaw in that logic: Girls have sex. Yes, even girls raised in homes where the fathers breathe fire and the mothers dress their daughters in the American version of burkas.

I don't have the research at hand today, but it shows a 10% or so difference in sexual activity between girls 15 to 25 who have taken a "virginity" pledge and those who haven't. Impressive? If you see the glass as half full. I still see girls having sex.

The Religious Right parents are making a big bet that their daughters won't have sex with an infected partner--given the virulence of cervical cancer, they're literally betting these girls' lives.

But if course, that's not enough for these parents. They won't be happy until they stop these drugs and risk your daughters' lives as well. And, later, if your kid can't get the vaccine and dies of cervical cancer, well, she deserved it.

And to prove that, I guess, your kid goes straight to hell.