Patna, Oct 6 ( UNI) Bihar Health Minister Mangal Pandey launched a free vaccination programme to prevent cervical cancer among women under the Chief Minister Girls Cancer Preventive scheme. The scheme was launched in a function here on Sunday during which some of the girls in between the age group of 9 to 14 were administered vaccine for human papilloma virus (HPV). Addressing the function Pandey said that the cabinet held under the leadership of Chief Minister Nitish Kumar on August 21 had approved the scheme under which the girls in between age group of 9 to 14 will be administered the HPV vaccine free of cost to prevent cervical cancer. For vaccination, subsidy would be given from Chief Minister Treatment Assistance Fund. Referring to the Census of 2011 Pandey said that the population between 9 to 14 years of age was around 1 crore and for the scheme Rs 150 crore would be spent annually. He said Bihar is the first state in the country to launch the scheme for administering HPV vaccination free of cost. On this occasion, Deputy Chief Minister Samrat Chaudhary said that in the first phase, the scheme was being launched in 5 districts including Patna, Nalanda, Siwan, Purnia and Muzaffarpur. He said that two doses of vaccine would be administered free of cost. Deputy Chief Minister Vijay Sinha said that cervical cancer was a serious ailment and according to World Health Organisation out of 5 patients one was from India. The number of patients suffering from cervical cancer was increasing rapidly. He said cervical cancer is one of the main reasons for death due to cancer and of the total death of adult women due to cancer it contributes 17 percent. Sinha said that nearly 1 lakh new cervical cancer was being reported annually in India...////...