Cervical cancer remains a critical public health problem that is second only to breast cancer in overall disease burden for women throughout the world. 1 It is still an important cause of mortality and morbidity in the developing countries. 2 Universal deployment of organized or opportunistic screening with Pap cytology in high and middle income countries has been the primary reason for the substantial reductions in cervical cancer morbidity and mortality during the last 50 years. However, in many low income countries Pap cytology screening is yet to be effectively implemented or has failed to reduce cervical cancer rates to an appreciable extent. 3 Screening appears to benefit only a small fraction of women although a much larger percentage endures the inconvenience of the Pap test in order to avoid cervical cancer. 2 Human papilloma virus (HPV) infection is one of the most common sexually transmitted diseases worldwide. Up to 79 million of sexually active women worldwide will become infected with HPV during their lifetime. 4 To date, more than 120 genotypes of Human Papilloma virus (HPV) are known, but only high risk oncogen genotypes could induce a cancer. HPV 16 and 18 are implied in nearly 70% of cervical cancer around the world. 5 In Bangladesh, the annual number of cases of cervical cancer is 1 1 956 and death is 6 582. 6 A prophylactic vaccine to protect against the precancerous and cancerous lesions associated with HPV should save lives, reduce expensive diagnostic and t herapeutic interventions, and have substantial individual and collective benefits. 5 In this review paper, we discuss the type of cervical vaccine and its mechanism of action. Various reports of trial and vaccine impact on different categories of women are also discussed. Function of vaccineThe current HPV vaccines are based on virus-like particles (VLPs) t hat are formed b y HPV surface components (viral capsid). They are not infectious, because they lack t he virus' DNA. However, t hey Introduction 157