Anal human papillomavirus infections in young unvaccinated men who have sex with men attending a sexual health clinic for HPV vaccination in Melbourne, Australia

Abstract

The Victorian Government introduced a time-limited quadrivalent human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccination catch-up program targeting gay and bisexual men who have sex with men (MSM) aged up to 26 years in 2017. As of 2017, men aged ≥20 years were not eligible for the school-based HPV vaccination program. This study examined the prevalence of anal HPV among 496 MSM aged 20–26 years before they received the first dose of the HPV vaccine at the Melbourne Sexual Health Centre, Australia. More than half (56.5%) had any high-risk HPV genotypes detected in the anus. Almost half (43.1%) had at least one quadrivalent HPV vaccine-preventable genotype (6, 11, 16 or 18) and one-fifth (21.0%) had HPV 16 detected in the anus. These findings suggest that a targeted catch-up HPV vaccination program for MSM is still beneficial to protect against high-risk HPV genotypes associated with anal cancer, as well as low-risk HPV genotypes.