School girls in Maidstone will this week become the first in west Kent to be immunised against cervical cancer.

Girls aged 17 to 18 at Invicta Grammar School, in Huntsman Lane, Maidstone, will have their first vaccinations tomorrow against two strains of the HPV virus, which cause 74 per cent of cases of cervical cancer.

Girls aged 12 and 13, in year eight, will be vaccinated later in the year.

The Government announced a national immunisation programme earlier this year, initially for girls aged 12, 13, 17 and 18.

It is the first time such a programme has been offered by the NHS.

There will be catch up schemes for girls aged 13 to 17 over the next two years. Research shows in uninfected girls the immunisation programme is 99 per cent effective at protecting against the two main strains of HPV.

NHS West Kent’s deputy director of public health, Dr Brendan O’Connor, said: "As the first widely available vaccine to protect against cancer this is a real breakthrough."

The vaccine does not replace the need for cervical screening later in life, as it does not target all forms of the virus.