Vaccines against cervical cancer

Cervical cancer and precancerous lesions of the genital tract are a major threat to women's health worldwide. Although the introduction of screening tests to detect cervical cancer and its precursor lesions has reduced overall cervical cancer rates in the developed world, the approach was largely unsuccessful for developing countries, primarily due to a lack of appropriate infrastructures and high costs. Annually, 470,000 cervical cancer cases are diagnosed worldwide, of which 80% occur in developing countries. Despite advances in treatment of cervical cancer, approximately half of the women afflicted with the disease will die. Over 20 years of dedicated research has provided conclusive evidence that a subset of human papillomaviruses are the aetiological agents for cervical cancer. Finding a viral origin for this disease provided the basis to fight cervical cancer using prophylactic or therapeutic vaccination. Both vaccine approaches are reviewed here, with an emphasis on recent clinical data.