Significant Drop in Female Genital Warts Due to Free HPV Vaccine

A new study shows that the introduction of national human papillomavirus vaccination program had led to a dramatic drop in cases of genital warts among young women.

Researchers at the University of Sydney found that the general practitioners have noticed a 61 percent drop in female genital warts post the introduction of the human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccination program.

There are nearly 40 types of HPV and nearly 20 million people in the U.S. are already infected with the virus and 6.2 million get infected each year. Genital warts are also known as HPV. HPV vaccines offer protection against the common sexually transmitted virus. The vaccines are available for both females and males.

It was in 2007, that the HPV vaccination program was introduced. After the introduction of the program, i.e. between 2008 and 2012, there was a significant drop in the rate of genital warts from 4.33 per 1,000 encounters pre-program to 1.67 per 1,000 encounters post-program.

In this study, the researchers looked at more than a million patient encounters between 2000 and 2012. There was a dramatic reduction every year in the management rate of genital warts in women aged 15-27 years, following the introduction of the vaccination program.

"The results show that the program has been a widespread success," said lead author of the study Christopher Harrison of the University of Sydney.

According to the study details, Australia is one of the first countries to offer free HPV vaccine to young women through the national immunization program. This HPV vaccine offers protection against two main viral causes of genital warts named HPV 6 and 11 and two major viral causes of cervical cancer, i.e. HPV 16 and 18. 

This is one of the early studies that highlight the impact of HPV vaccination on the management of genital warts in general practice.

"We looked at women potentially covered by the vaccination program (15-27 years), and the data showed a 61 per cent decrease in the management rate of genital warts in the four years after the program started, compared with the four years before the program. This is an excellent result as not only do genital warts cause distress in affected patients, but treatment is at a substantial cost to the health system," said Harrison.

However, there was no change in the management rate of genital warts among other age-sex groups between the pre-program and post-program period.

They noticed no reduction in other sexually transmitted infections during this period, indicating that drop in genital warts was mainly due to the introduction of vaccination program.

The finding was documented in the PLOs One journal.