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Nearly half of HIV-positive gay men could benefit from being vaccinated against HPV, say Irish researchers
Gus Cairns, 2014-09-29 10:10:00
A study of gay men in Ireland that has investigated the prevalence of infection with the human papilloma virus (HPV), some types of which cause genital warts and cervical, anal and oral cancers, concludes that 47% of HIV positive and 77% of HIV negative gay men would benefit from being given one of the HPV vaccines against the two most common cancer-causing types.
Even though a much higher proportion of gay men than the general public are already infected with cancer-causing varieties of HPV and would not therefore benefit from a vaccine, they are still in the minority: and the fact that anal cancer is 17-35 times more common in gay men than the general public, and 35-70 times more common in HIV-positive gay men, makes vaccination with the HPV vaccines Cervarix (which offers near-100% protection against the two most common cancer-causing types of HPV) or Gardasil (which also offers 100% protection against the two most common wart-causing types) still worthwhile.
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