Student Newspaper of the University of Southern California Since 1912 | www.dailytrojan.com | VOL. 165, NO. 40 | Tuesday October 21, 2008
By Kelly Moffitt
Daily Trojan
When pharmaceutical compa-ny
Merck introduced Gardasil two
years ago, the vaccine was hailed as
a tide turner in the battle against
human papillomavirus and cervi-cal
cancer, which is linked to HPV.
More than 11,000 women are di-agnosed
with cervical cancer each
year and 4,000 people die from it,
according to the American Cancer
Society.
But statistics released by the
Center for Disease Control in ear-ly
October showed that just 25 per-cent
of young
women aged
13 to 17 years
old — 2.5 mil-lion
women in
all — had re-ceived
the im-munization,
a number ex-perts
call disheartening.
About 50 percent of college wom-en
are infected with the HPV virus,
according to the American Cancer
Society. An estimated 80 percent
of women will become infected
with HPV by the age of 50, though
only a small portion of those wom-en
will actually get cervical cancer,
according to the Center for Disease
Control.
Martin Kast, a professor of molec-ular
microbiology and immunology
with the USC/Norris Comprehensive
Cancer Center, said these results are
both comforting and troubling.
“It’s not bad that the immuniza-tions
have reached 25 percent, but
it certainly isn’t enough,” Kast said.
“The most enthusiastic teens have
now been vaccinated. But now... we
have to reach those who are not that
enthusiastic about the drug.”
The CDC noted that more than
15 million doses of the vaccine have
been given out so far and that the
survey did not cover all of the peo-ple
who were given the vaccine.
The University Park Health
Center has offered the vaccine since
it hit the market. Three shots are
given to female students, each cost-ing
$145, though they can be reim-bursed
depending on the student’s
insurance plan.
Donna Beard Gilchrist, a women’s
health specialist and nurse prac-titioner
at the health center, said
more and more women are coming
in to receive the vaccine.
“I have the conversation with ev-ery
young woman who comes into
my office about the availability of
the vaccine,” Gilchrist said. “Many
of them ask me about it before I can
bring up the subject.”
Kimberly Berger, a freshman ma-joring
in neuroscience, said she was
vaccinated with Gardasil last year
after her friend was part of a study
for the vaccine.
“She convinced me that I need-ed
to get vaccinated,” Berger said.
“I had to convince my mom because
she didn’t want me to get the immu-nization
because she didn’t know
enough about it and didn’t think
enough research had been done
on it. I told her I wanted to get the
vaccines in order to protect myself
against the possibility of cervical
cancer.”
Gilchrist said college-aged wom-en
should get vaccinated despite the
fact that Gardasil is marketed to
younger girls.
“The majority of people are being
InDEX
2 · News Digest
4 · Opinion
5 · Lifestyle
8 · Classifieds
9 · Crossword
12 · Sports
Sweet Stuff: Chocolate
company strives to sweeten
things up. PAGE 5
Line Dance: Howell’s
performance against Cougars
turns heads. PAGE 12
Brandon Hui | Daily Trojan
The sprint · Students from organizations across campus came together to register student voters on the
last day of a three-month-long registration drive. Monday was also the final day to register in California.
| see health, page 2 |
By ariel edwards-levy
Daily Trojan
Hip-hop artist and actor Common
will headline a concert Oct. 30 en-couraging
students to vote in the
November election, Undergraduate
Student Government announced
Monday night.
The VoteSCount Concert, which
will be held at 8 p.m. in McCarthy
Quad, will also feature New Orleans
hip-hop duo The Knux.
The concert marks the culmi-nation
of a campus voter registra-tion
effort by a coalition of student
groups including USG, CalPIRG,
Students for Barack Obama,
Students for John McCain, USC
College Democrats, USC College
Republicans, the Unruh Institute
of Politics and the Political Student
Assembly.
The drive aimed to register
6,000 students, but fell short of the
goal with 4,772 registrants as of
Saturday. The final numbers are
expected to come in at about 5,000,
said Samantha Foley, USG director
of campus affairs.
“The purpose of the concert is to
bring students out in an entertain-ment
setting, but at the same time
make sure they get the message that
now that we’ve gotten some 5,000
students registered, it’s time for
them to do their duty and go out and
vote,” she said.
Common is a two-time Grammy
winner and has appeared in films
including “Smoking Aces” and
Common to headline pre-election bash
USG plans to host concert after
VoteSCount, which registered
just under 5,000 students.
| see concert, page 3 |
By maria nikias
Daily Trojan
The USC Stevens Institute for Innovation
launched MatchYard last week, a Facebook
application designed to connect students, fac-ulty
and staff with their work on their origi-nal
projects.
MatchYard is designed to help members
of the USC community from different back-grounds
come together to work on projects.
Since the beta version of the application
launched last March, 1,366 students have
joined MatchYard, and currently more than
50 projects are in progress.
As more students have added the applica-tion,
USC Stevens has begun to make changes
to the program, including a new feature that
allows users to make recommendations for
other users in future projects.
Juan Felipe Vallejo, director of innovation
development at USC Stevens, said the insti-tute
relies on feedback from users to make
future changes to the application.
“You make changes of the application based
on the feedback you get back. If the feedback
makes sense, then we make changes,” Vallejo
said.
To encourage more students to join, USC
Stevens sent out a mass e-mail informing stu-dents,
faculty and staff about the application.
Along with the notification, the e-mail en-couraged
students to join by offering them the
chance to win $1,000 and an all-expense paid
in-person meeting with Mark Stevens, a ven-ture
capitalist and USC trustee.
“I just signed up for the money. I don’t know
if this application would be an asset to me at
this point,” said Andrea Davidowitz, a senior
majoring in kinesiology. “I think in certain ar-eas
its beneficial, but in my field I need to be
making contacts who are already practicing.
I think for it to be improved it would need to
differentiate itself from the actual Facebook
website.”
While many students said they were mo-tivated
to join by the cash prize, others said
they were intrigued by the novel concept.
“I’m the kind of person who is cautious
New Facebook app means more
collaboration for student projects
With MatchYard, members of the USC
community can come together to share
ideas and work on academic projects.
| see matchyard, page 3 |
Second in a
series on
women’s
health
For women, HPV is a
formidable challenge
A new vaccine has helped
millions of women, but has
fallen short of eliminating HPV.
14
Days Until
Election
COUNTDOWN
A woman holds a sign reading, “Who are you here for?” and students write names of family
members and friends who have been victims of domestic violence as part of a vigil to pro-mote
awareness. The event was hosted by sororities Alpha Chi Omega and Omega Phi Beta.
Mourning Violence
Young Kim | Daily Trojan