Human papillomavirus variants and squamous neoplasia of the cervix

Human papillomaviruses (HPVs) play a central role in the aetiology of cervi cal neoplasia, However, only a small proportion of cervical intraepithelial lesions infected with high-risk HPVs will progress to invasive cervical ca rcinoma, which indicates the involvement of additional factors, An importan t emerging viral factor is naturally occurring intratypic sequence variatio n, Such variation has been used to study the geographical spread of HPVs, b ut there is increasing evidence that it may be important in determining the risk of development of neoplastic disease. The collected data indicate tha t different HPV variants have altered biochemical and biological properties and represent an additional risk factor in the development of squamous int raepithelial lesions and invasive carcinoma of the cervix. This may be rele vant not only to the biology of HPV infection and its association with squa mous neoplasia, but also to the use of HPV typing in clinical practice, Cop yright (C) 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.