Human papillomavirus prevalence and distribution in a Spanish population
since the start of the vaccination program
Abstract
Vaccination against high-risk human papillomaviruses (HPV) is currently
the main mechanism for reducing cervical cancer in Spain. The objective
of this study is to investigate the prevalence and distribution of HPV
types within a population of 30,947 subjects with suspicion of HPV
infection and/or with a genital lesion diagnostic from 2007 to 2022.
Samples were analysed by polymerase chain reaction (PCR), restriction
fragment length polymorphism (RFLP) analysis and/or DNA sequencing. An
overall HPV prevalence of 29.2% and 49 different types were verified,
of which HPV 16, 53, 31, 66, 6, 58, 61, 33, 18 and 84 were the most
common. HPV 6, 16, 31 and 33 were more prevalent in younger populations,
while HPV 18, 53, 58, 61, 70 and 83 presented higher frequencies in
older ages. High-risk HPVs had a frequency of 47.3% in positive
samples, which was higher in atypical squamous or glandular cells
(73.7%), low-degree squamous intraepithelial lesions (67.0%) and
high-degree squamous intraepithelial lesions (87.1%). A reduction
tendency of high-risk HPVs was observed during the studied period,
indicating the effectiveness of the vaccination program. By determining
the HPV distribution in Spain, this study presents baseline information
that can be applied for assessing prophylactic and therapeutic
strategies.