Monthly Archive for February, 2011
About 5 percent of cancers worldwide are caused by HPV, and some turn up in some surprising places. A University of Washington study found that some men carry HPV 26 under their fingernails, which can lead to a form of cancer called digital squamous cell carcinoma. Proper hand-washing can help prevent this from happening, said Dr. Diane Harper, leading HPV researcher at the University of Missouri in Kansas City.
The latest data suggest that 64% of oropharynx cancers – growing in the middle part of the throat – in the United States are caused by HPV, which is more than tobacco causes, said Maura Gillison of Ohio State University. And as the number of partners on whom you have performed oral sex goes up, the risk of oropharnyx cancer goes up.
About 37,000 people per year receive a diagnosis of oral cancer, according to the Oral Cancer Foundation.
Just about everyone has had at least one of the 130 strains of HPV; not all of them are cancer-causing. Certain types cause warts on the hands and feet that are benign.
Two well-established mechanisms of prevention in terms of sexually transmitted HPV are condom usage and circumcision, although neither completely eliminates the risk, Harper said.
As for getting HPV from kissing, that’s not clear, and there isn’t enough data to say anything about it yet, Harper said.
It’s very hard to get teens to listen to abstinence messages about oral sex, or to get them to use any kind of barrier method for these behaviors, Halpern-Felsher said. And since any risk factor under 50% sounds low to a very young person, throwing these precise statistics at them most likely won’t make a difference.
But parents should have honest conversations with their teenagers about oral sex, Halpern-Felsher said. Tell them that the consequences of HPV may not happen right away, and while the risks may not be huge, they are significant. Potential long-term outcomes of cancer are quite concerning.
