Prevalence and risk profile of cervical human papillomavirus infection in Zhejiang Province, southeast China: a population-based study

Background: Benign or malignant lesions caused by Human papillomavirus (HPV) produce considerable health burden worldwide. Since limited cross-protection would be offered between HPV types, heterogeneity in HPV type-specific distribution should be taken into account when predicting the effect of current prophylactic vaccines and forming the basic for the second-generation vaccines targeted to specific regions. Here, we investigated the prevalence of cervical HPV infection, as well as predictors concerned, in Zhejiang Province, southeast China. Results: Totally 4987 cervical samples from five randomly chosen counties in Zhejiang Province were detected. The overall HPV prevalence was 13.3%. Established high-risk (HR) HPV prevalence was 10.2%. HPV-52 was the most prevalent type (3.1%), followed by HPV-16 (2.5%),-58 (2.1%),-68 (1.0%) and-81 (0.9%). HPV-16 or-18 were present in 3.1% of the detected samples, while 174 specimens (3.5%) were positive for any of HPV-6,-11,-16 and-18. The prevalence of HPV vaccine types was consistently low across age groups. Bimodal age distribution in HR-HPV, including established HR and probably HR-HPV, was observed, with a clear second peak in perimenopausal women. Multivariate unconditional logistic regression models revealed that partner's lifetime number of partners was the only common independent predictor of overall, established HR, established low-risk, single-type and multiple-type HPV infection in current study. Conclusions: We have observed low prevalence of HPV vaccine types and relatively high prevalence of HPV-52 and-58 in our population. Our findings support universal "catch-up"vaccination of sexual experienced young women in Zhejiang Province, as well as enhance the hypothesis that the second-generation HPV prophylactic vaccines including HPV-52 and-58 may offer higher protection for women in China and other Asian areas. Furthermore, our data support close surveillance of perimenopausal women with HR-HPV infection.