High prevalence of human papillomaviruses in Ghanaian pregnant women

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Data about the prevalence of human papillomaviruses (HPV) in African women with normal and abnormal cervical cytology are still scarce. Current HPV vaccines contain HPV types, which mainly represent the HPV epidemiology of industrial countries. As further developments of HPV vaccines are going on, it is necessary to regard regional differences in HPV type prevalence to ensure optimal protection by the vaccine. Vaginal swabs of Ghanaian pregnant women, routinely collected before delivery to rule out bacterial infections causing early onset sepsis, were screened for 12 high-risk (HR), 13 probably/possibly (pHR), and 18 low-risk (LR) HPV types. Most pregnant women come for delivery to the hospital. This was considered as appropriate possibility to have an unselected group of women. HPV DNA were detected in 55/165 women (33.3, 95% CI 26.3-41.1%). Thirty-four out of fifty-five (61.8, 95% CI 47.7-74.3%) of HPV-positive women were infected with HR and/or pHR HPV types. The five most prevalent HR or pHR HPV types were HPV-52 and HPV-67 (7 women each, 4.2, 95% CI 1.9-8.9%), HPV-53 (six women, 3.6, 95% CI 1.5-8.1%), HPV-45 (five women, 3.0, 95% CI 1.1-7.3%), and HPV-18 (four women, 2.4, 95% CI 0.8-6.5%), respectively. HPV-16 was found in two women only (1.2, 95% CI 0.2-4.8%). Future HPV vaccine research may devote special interest to HPV-67 and HPV-53 provided further studies confirm their high prevalence in the general population of Sub-Saharan African countries. The true carcinogenic potential of HPV-67, which is a member of species alpha9 including HPV-16, and so far categorized as pHR, should be clarified.