Is Reproductive Tract Infection an Ordeal for Women’s Health?

The crucial changes in the vast community of viruses present in the female genital tract may enable persistent HPV infection to progress into cancer, demonstrates new research appearing in the journal mSystems. The Human papillomavirus (HPV) is a known risk factor for cervical cancer. Genital HPV infections are contracted through sexual intercourse, anal sex, and another skin-to-skin contact in the genital region.

Cervical cancer is one of the most common cancers among women. In 2020, more than 600,000 cases and 340,000 deaths were reported worldwide.

Researchers at Arizona State University are hoping to understand the factors that lead to persistent HPV infection to cancer, by studying the complex communities of microbes in the female reproductive tract, known as the vaginal microbiome.

Recent studies have explored the relationship of the vaginal microbiome to cervical cancer, though the viral component has often been neglected. Viruses interact with both human cells and the vast profusion of bacteria present in the genital tract.

“Microbes maintain a delicate balance in our body to promote health”, said Efrem Lim, a researcher with the Asu Biodesign Centre for Fundamental and Applied Microbiomics.

The new study uses next-generation gene sequencing to get a clearer read on the community of viruses present in vaginal microbiome samples from women in the Phoenix, Arizona metropolitan area.

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The results highlight an association between genital inflammation and low abundance of the bacterial species Lactobacillus with the reduction in virome diversity. Lactobacillus bacteria are known to be important mediators of genital health.

Further, conditions conducive to persistent HPV infection were also associated with the abundance of a group of viruses that infect bacteria known as bacteriophages.

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Source-Medindia