A modelling study published has found switching from bivalent to nonavalent HPV vaccination is likely to be cost-saving and have a significant impact on reducing the cervical cancer burden in China. Several domestically-manufactured nonavalent HPV vaccine candidates are in phase III clinical trials and their future availability may address the current dilemma of insufficient supply and high price of the overseas-manufactured nonavalent HPV vaccine in China.
Researchers used a previously validated transmission model to project the lifetime costs and effectiveness of five same-vaccine and two mixed-vaccine strategies from a societal perspective. Nonavalent HPV vaccines were assumed to be available and meet the production requirements for national vaccination between 2030 and 2050. All women living or projected to be born in China during 2023–2100 were considered.
Under the pricing assumptions used, switching to nonavalent vaccination was always cost-saving compared with maintaining the current bivalent vaccination programme, irrespective of the screening scenarios and the year when nonavalent vaccine was assumed to become available (status quo screening: net cost saving $2589–5211 million; improved screening: net cost saving $1852–3789 million). In the same-vaccine strategies, the optimal strategy changed from “routine nonavalent HPV vaccination with catch-up to age 18” to “switching from bivalent to nonavalent HPV vaccination” if nonavalent vaccination is available after 2035. Compared with the optimal same-vaccine strategy, adopting mixed schedules with bivalent and nonavalent vaccines would further save $1336–4280 million net costs and gain 87,000–833,000 QALYs, depending on the screening scenario and the year when nonavalent vaccine becomes available.
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