Welcome back, kiddies. Spring Break! Woo-hoo! I’m sure y’all indulged in plenty of horizontal jogging and top-shelf tequila tasting, didn’t y’all? How fun. I can practically taste your sun-drenched mishaps from here. Good job, kids.

But while you were out judging (or competing in) wet T-shirt contests and getting low-grade skin cancer, I was holding down the fort in the wilds of Allston and distributing forties to the homeless and legally insane. And of course, contemplating your sex lives and your sexual health.

Because, contrary to what the intellectual giants on “Laguna Beach” have told you, what happens in Cabo does not stay in Cabo. Well, not always. That novelty glass from Señor Frog’s? That stays in Cabo. That one-night stand with that total hottie (OMG, OMG) from USC? Not so much.

What I’m getting at is that as much as you don’t want to be responsible for anything (certainly not after visiting Señor Frog’s), there are some unsavory consequences of your sex life. Some are fairly harmless (think “the wet spot”) while others are potentially expensive and politically contentious (unwanted pregnancy). And somewhere between these two extremes falls a broad and nasty spectrum of sex germs, formally know as STDs, STIs and your mother’s greatest fear.

These nasty little buggers wreak all sorts of havoc on your lovely body. What’s worse is there’s so damn many of them I couldn’t possibly talk about the gamut in 800 words, so I’m just going to get on my soap box for one.

Human papillomavirus. HPV. The Center for Disease Control says that at least 50 percent of sexually active men and women acquire genital HPV during their lives and that about 6.2 million Americans get an HPV infection each year. What does this mean to the average college kids slutting their way through Saturday nights? It means that you have very likely been exposed to HPV. Put the paper down for a minute, look around your classroom. Half.

Condoms don’t always protect against HPV: 10 of the 30 strands are linked to cervical cancer. Sometimes it manifests on the skin as warts and other times there are no symptoms — you can have it and never even know it. There is no cure.

I don’t want to create an alarmist attitude, but HPV isn’t just genital warts (as if that isn’t bad enough). You heard what I said in the last graf, the big C-word (no not that one). I know that you’ve probably seen the ads for Gardasil, the ones with the fresh-faced girls wearing T-shirts that say “One Less.” You probably flip the channel to “Hogan Knows Best” (because that’s what I do). You assume it won’t affect you, but the reality is that HPV and cervical cancer probably will affect you or someone you know, and without sounding preachy, I urge you to be vaccinated. It’s not just a matter of being clean for yourself, it’s a matter of public health.

In June 2006, the Food and Drug Administration approved Gardasil for women nine to 26 years of age. Andrew C. von Eschenbach, the Acting Commissioner of the FDA, called it a “significant advance in the protection of women’s health” in a June 8, 2006 FDA press release. The vaccine is given as three injections over a period of six months. It protects against four “high-risk” strands of HPV and must be given before exposure to the virus.

Gardasil is designed to help prevent HPV. Specifically, it protects against HPV types 16 and 18, which are responsible for 70 percent of reported cases of cervical cancer. The National Cancer Institute predicted in 2006, approximately 10,000 women in the United States would be diagnosed with cervical cancer and that nearly 4,000 would die from it.

So wouldn’t it be nice if we could all keep clean? As clean as possible? Boston University, as large as it is in numbers, can end up being so small in reality. And I don’t want to end up sleeping with your best friend’s sleazy ex-boyfriend’s bed buddy’s best guyfriend if that virus has been passed along from you and eventually to me. That didn’t even make sense did it? The point is these things get around like rumors in a high school cafeteria. From the popular kids’ table, to the burners’ table, to the band kids’ table. So, getting the vaccine and keeping yourself safe is beneficial to you, your partner and all of your future partners. Wrap it up and be smart, because smart is sexy.

Gardasil is available at Student Health Services, check with your insurance company to see if they will help cover the cost of the vaccine.

Meredith Spencer, a junior in the College of Communication, is a weekly columnist for The Daily Free Press. She can be reached at [email protected].