Does HPV (human papilloma virus) – the virus we know to be responsible for most cases of cervical cancer – cause lung cancer?
Human Papilloma Virus (HPV), National Cancer Institute
The answer is – it may.
As many of us grow weary of the controversy over the HPV vaccine, we now have another variable thrown into the expanding equation. According to the authors of a study published in the journal Lung Cancer, HPV may even be the 2nd most important cause of lung cancer after smoking.
How did they come to that conclusion?
As the link between HPV and cervical cancer was discovered by finding HPV in cervical cancer cells, HPV has been found in roughly 20-25% of lung cancers in the United States. Whether this frames HPV as a cause of lung cancer, however, is another question. People with lung cancer are more likely to use oxygen than the general public, yet nobody would theorize that oxygen causes lung cancer. But it is a question we need to look at very closely.
According to current thought, HPV most likely works as a cofactor in the development of lung cancer, that is, something that works together with another risk factor such as smoking or radon to cause cancer. If this turns out to be the case, learning about HPV prevention might be something we need to add to our efforts to prevent lung cancer in the future.
Read more about HPV and lung cancer:
.Sources:
Giulani, L. et al. Human papillomavirus infections in lung cancer. Detection of E6 and E7 transcripts and review of the literature. Anticancer Research. 2007. 27(4C):2697-704.
Hsu, N. et al. Association between expression of human papillomavirus 16/18 E6 oncoprotein and survival in patients with stage I non-small cell lung cancer. Oncology Reports. 2009. 21(1):81-87.
Klein, F. et al. Incidence of human papilloma virus in lung cancer. Lung Cancer. 2008. Nov 17. (Epub ahead of Print).
Lim, W. et al. Assessment of human papillomavirus and Epstein-Barr virus in lung adenocarcinoma. Oncology Reports. 2009. 21(4):971-5.
National Cancer Institute. Human Papillomaviruses and Cancer: Questions and Answers. 02/14/08. http://www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/factsheet/risk/HPV.
Rezazadeh, A. et al. Detection of HPV in different subtypes of non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). Journal of Clinical Oncology. 2008. 26, No 15S(May 20 Suppl):22098.
Rezazadeh, A. et al. The role of human papilloma virus in lung cancer: a review of the evidence. The American Journal of the Medical Sciences. 2009. 338(1):64-7.
Wang, Y. et al. Human papillomavirus 16 and 18 infection is associated with lung cancer patients from the central part of China. Oncology Reports. 2008. 20(2):333-9.
Yu, Y. et al. Correlation of HPV-16/18 infection of human papillomaviurs with lung squamous cell carcinomas in Western China. Oncology Reports. 2009. 21(6):1637-32.
