AUSTRALIA ON TRACK TO ELIMINATE CERVICAL CANCER BY 2028

How Australia Is on Course to Become the First Country to Eliminate Cervical Cancer as a Public Health Problem

A landmark modelling study published in The Lancet Public Health has projected that Australia could eliminate cervical cancer as a public health problem as early as 2028, making it the first country in the world to achieve this milestone. Elimination, as defined by the World Health Organization, means reaching a sustained annual incidence below four new cases per 100,000 women. This threshold is not eradication of the disease, but it represents the point at which cervical cancer can no longer be considered a public health threat.

The projection is built on decades of sustained policy action. Australia launched the world's first national HPV vaccination program in 2007, initially targeting schoolgirls and later expanded to include boys from 2013. In December 2017, the country transitioned from two-yearly Pap smear cytology screening to a more sensitive primary HPV testing program offered every five years for women aged 25 to 74. In 2018, Australia upgraded to the nonavalent vaccine, which protects against approximately 90 percent of cancer-causing HPV strains. In 2023, Australia further simplified the vaccination schedule to a single-dose recommendation for those immunised before age 26.

The modelling estimates that under current vaccination and screening coverage levels, the annual incidence of cervical cancer in Australia will fall below the four-case elimination threshold around 2028. The researchers project that by 2034, cervical cancer mortality will fall below one death per 100,000 women annually.

Current data from Australia's 2025 Cervical Cancer Elimination Progress Report confirms the trajectory is tracking as predicted. No cervical cancer cases were diagnosed in women under 25 in Australia in 2021, the first time this had occurred in records going back to 1982. Prevalence of HPV strains 16 and 18 was recorded at just 1.4 percent in 25 to 29-year-olds in 2024 screening data. Rates of high-grade cervical pre-cancer lesions have declined by 21 percent compared to the corresponding year in the first screening round.

However, the 2025 Progress Report also sounded a clear warning: HPV vaccination coverage rates and cervical screening participation rates have both declined from their peaks. By 2024, HPV vaccine coverage at age 15 had dropped to 79.5 percent nationally, down from a peak of 85.7 percent in 2020. A separate Lancet modelling study published in February 2026 projects that cervical cancer elimination among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women, who face an incidence rate of approximately 11.7 cases per 100,000 women, nearly double the national average, will not occur until 2047 under current conditions, 21 years behind the national trajectory.

The Australian government committed 59 million Australian dollars in 2025 to implement measures supporting the National Strategy for the Elimination of Cervical Cancer. A government campaign called Own It, designed to raise awareness of self-collection screening, achieved a 45 percent increase in awareness among target audiences including First Nations, multicultural, LGBTQIA+, disability, and regional communities.

Globally, cervical cancer remains a major burden. In 2022, more than 662,000 cases were diagnosed worldwide and over 348,000 deaths occurred, with approximately 94 percent of those deaths in low and lower-middle income countries. Australia's trajectory offers a powerful real-world validation of population-level HPV vaccination and primary HPV screening combined. The question now is whether Australia can accelerate equitable coverage to ensure that 2028 represents a genuine national milestone rather than an average that masks persistent disparities for the country's most vulnerable communities.

Sources: Lancet Public Health (Hall et al., 2018) | 2025 Cervical Cancer Elimination Progress Report, C4 | Lancet Public Health (February 2026) | Australian Government, November 2025 | WHO Global Cervical Cancer Strategy | TGA Australia