GSK's claim cervarix HPV vaccine affords long-term protection against fourmain HPV types

Cervical cancer affects the 2nd most common cancer in women aged 15-45, affects over over 1.4 million women, is the third leading cause of death by cancer in women , after breast and lung cancer.

Most of the deaths occur in the developing world. Cervical cancer is an invasive and patient slow growing problem often diagnosed too late for effective action unless regular screening is provided.

The cause is a virus called human papillomavirus (HPV) transmitted by sexual activity both between men and women and between men and men and women and women. Cervical cancer is a sexually transmitted disease. Condom use fails to provide adequate protection as transmission does not require intercours but may occur simply through skin-to-skin contact in the genital area.

As HPV is almost symptomless people can be infected and transmit the without even knowing it.

Of the known 100 known types of HPV only about 15 can cause cervical cancer. Only 4 of these are the most commmon (16, 18, 45 and 31) and appear to devliver some 80% of observed cases.

HPV 16, 18 and 45 are are associated with nearly 90% of cases of adenocarcinoma, a very aggressive form of cervical cancer.

On Monday (International Women's day) at the Society of Gynecologic Oncologists' Annual Meeting on Women's Cancer, Glaxo Smith Kline presented new clinical data for what they call their "cervical cancer vaccine", Cervarix - competitor to Merck's Gardasil.

They show that it provided significant protection against four types of human papillomavirus (types 16 and 18) for almost six and a half years.

These follow-up analyses, involving women aged 15 to 25 years, demonstrated ;

1 . Cervarix was 100 % effective at preventing precancerous lesions caused by virus types 16 and 18 over six and a half years.

2. Cervarix was 78 % and 60 %t effective at preventing incident infection caused by virus types 45 and 31, respectively.

GSK say this shows the "longest duration of consistently high antibody levels demonstrated by a cervical cancer vaccine."

GSK literature promotes the claim of Anna-Barbara Moscicki, MD, Professor of Pediatrics, Universityof California, San Francisco who runs a Teen Colcoscopy Clinic. "Vaccination of pre-teen/adolescent girls against cancer-causing HPV before onset of sexual activity will be an important part of the overall strategy for cervical cancer prevention."

See Wikipedia on Gardasil and HPVresource.org