Does the HPV Vaccine Protect Against Cervical Precancer?

Prophylactic human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccines are safe and effective for the prevention of cervical precancer in adolescent girls and young women, according to a new study.

For their study, the researchers evaluated data from 26 trials (N = 73,428) published through June 2017. Trial data were obtained from MEDLINE, Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials, and Embase databases.
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Cochrane methodology and the Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development and Evaluation scale were used to rate the certainty of evidence for vaccine protection against cervical precancer and for harms. Participants’ baseline HPV DNA status was used to distinguish between the effects of the vaccines.

Results of the study revealed that, regardless of DNA status, HPV vaccination was associated with a risk reduction of 341 to 157/10,000 (risk ratio [RR] 0.46) for cervical intraepithelial neoplasia grade 2+ associated with HPV16/18. The researchers observed similar reductions in risk for cervical intraepithelial neoplasia grade 3+ associated with HPV16/18.

HPV vaccination was also found to be associated with a 14 to 5/10,000 reduction in the number of women with adenocarcinoma-in-situ associated with HPV16/18.

The researchers noted that they did not observe an increased risk of serious adverse effects associated with HPV vaccination.

“There is high-certainty evidence that HPV vaccines protect against cervical precancer in adolescent girls and young women aged 15 to 26,” the researchers concluded. “The effect is higher for lesions associated with HPV16/18 than for lesions irrespective of HPV type.”

—Christina Vogt

Reference:

Arbyn M, Xu L, Simoens C, Martin-Hirsch PPL. Prophylactic vaccination against human papillomaviruses to prevent cervical cancer and its precursors [Published online May 9, 2018]. Cochrane Libr. doi:10.1002/14651858.CD009069.pub3