Recently I signed a consent form for my 12 year old daughter to have the hpv vaccine. At first I was all for her having it but now I am having second thoughts.

How much do we really know about this vaccination? A friend of mine had searched for so much information on this before deciding her child was not to have it.

To be honest I thought that maybe she was just trying to scare me with the 'facts' she had found out and I completely dissmissed her concerns. I even spoke to a nurse today who had told me that her daughter had this needle and was perfectly fine but didn't give me anymore information. I wanted to be told that this was perfectly safe and that there were no serious side affects, but was told nothing.

Now the same friend as put it all over her wall on 'facebook' the reasons why her child is not getting it, my paranoia has well and truly kicked in and I have now tried to research it a bit more.

I have not really been one for believing everything I read on the internet but I was curious to know what the side affects are and what I have found is shocking especially the part that says 'There have been over 26,500 side effects reported with nearly 5,500 of them still not recovered.'

This has scared me so much. I am all for fighting against cancer and I will also do anything to protect my children but are they just being a guinea pig for this farely new vaccination? Yes, it may work in the furture but what about the problems it can cause within a few minutes,days,weeks, months of having it? Am I putting my child at risk? Is there actually any proof that this actually works?

My daughter is due to have the first injection in about a week and I really want to know if I would be in the wrong for actually changing my mind about her getting it done. I don't want to put my child at risk if she does have it but I don't want her to be at risk if she doesn't.

Are there any parents out there who have allowed their child/ren to go ahead with this that put some light on the whole thing? Where there any side affects? Is my friend just being paranoid and is trying to put me off? Am I even looking up the right information online?