Condoms do, in fact, effectively reduce the risk of human papillomavirus (HPV) transmission according to a study in this week's New England Journal of Medicine. On the heels of the FDA's approval of Gardasil, the new HPV vaccine, these findings will expand the arsenal of protection against the virus that affects over 50% of the American population and is the cause of almost all cases of cervical cancer.
This study was the first of its kind to establish a temporal relationship between condom use and HPV infection. Researchers monitored eighty-two college women through regular gynecological exams and Web-based diaries that described their daily sexual behavior. The researchers also restricted the study to healthy women who had their first sexual encounters during the course of the study, thereby ensuring that the onset of HPV infection could be pinpointed precisely.
Women whose partners used condoms 100% of the time were 70% less likely to acquire a new HPV infection than women who did not use them. Women whose partners used condoms 50% of the time still had a 50% reduction in risk of acquiring a new infection. The 100%-users showed no evidence of precancerous lesions.
According to the researchers, women are at risk for HPV infection if they do not use a condom consistently and when they have sex with a new partner. The number of sexual encounters (with the same partner) was found to be insignificant.
This study will certainly reassure those who advocate for the usage of condoms to promote "safer sex." Proponents of abstinence-only raise the concern, however, that encouraging condom usage undermines efforts to reduce risk because it encourages people to have sex more often. A related article in the NEJM points to a study recently published in the Journal of Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndromes that assessed condom-related disease prevention techniques. After reviewing 174 different studies, the researchers concluded that these interventions do not "increase the overall frequency of sexual behavior."
These results confirm both that regular condom usage reduces the risk of contracting cancer-causing HPV and that encouraging such use does not promote risky sexual behavior.
Jaclyn Eisenberg is a research intern at the American Council on Science and Health (ACSH.org, HealthFactsAndFears.com).
