HUMAN PAPILLOMAVIRUSES - PEDIATRIC PERSPECTIVES ON A FAMILY OF MULTIFACETED TUMORIGENIC PATHOGENS

For most children warts are a nuisance. They seemingly wax and wane as they please, often in the absence of therapy. Their mysterious place in human biology was best described by Lewis Thomas who marveled at their response to hypnotic suggestion and dubbed them a potential scientific link to the subconscious mind.1 Genital warts can be especially overwhelming and have been described as “a manifestation of the Wrath of God.2 Early in this century it was shown that warts are a readily transmissible infectious disease3 caused by human papillomaviruses (HPVs), which are among the most common infectious agents in pediatrics. Only with the application of modern techniques in molecular biology for detecting HPV virions and HPV DNA, however, has the full scope of these agents as human pathogens been realized. Specific considerations regarding the diagnosis and treatment of benign HPV-induced lesions have been recently described.4 This review is intended to provide a more broad appreciation for the role of HPV infection in disease; it will hopefully heighten the pediatrician's awareness of the range of HPV morbidity in pediatrics as well as the importance of HPVs as tools for studying molecular mechanisms of gene expression and cancer. © 1990 by Williams and Wilkins.