Prevalence, Characteristics, and Distribution of Human Papillomavirus According to Age and HIV Status in Women of Eastern Cape Province, South Africa

Human papillomavirus (HPV) is a sexually transmitted infection associated with the development of cervical cancer. This study investigated cervical HPV prevalence, characteristics, and distribution according to age and human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) status among women attending a public community health facility in the Eastern Cape Province of South Africa. A total of 325 participants (aged 18 to 60) visiting a community health facility for any reason were recruited. Cervical HPV infection was detected using the Seegene Anyplex™ II HPV28 assay (Seegene Inc., Seoul, South Korea). Overall HPV prevalence was 65.2% (95% CI: 59.9-70.2%), with the highest prevalence of 80.9% (95% CI: 67.2-89.8%) observed in the 18-25-year-old age group and the lowest prevalence of 46.3% (95% CI: 35.8-57.1%) in the 46-60-year-old age group. HR-HPV infection was found to decrease with increasing age (<i>p</i> < 0.001) in the overall population and according to HIV status. In contrast, LR-HPV infection was found to significantly decrease with age among HIV-negative women (<i>p</i> = 0.001) but not for the overall population and HIV-positive women. A proportion of 12.9% were infected with one or more HPV types covered by the Cervarix^® HPV vaccine (HPV-16 and/or -18), 18.8% (by those covered by Gardasil^®4 (HPV-6, -11, -16 and/or -18), and 42.2% by those covered by Gardasil^®9 (HPV-6, -11, -16, -18, -31, -33, -45, -52 and/or -58). The alpha-9 HPV species was the most dominant species (40.6%), followed by the alpha-7 species (29.8%). High overall HPV, HR-HPV, and alpha-9 species prevalence were observed among the women attending the public health facility. These findings contribute to the limited HPV distribution data among the Eastern Cape women, which could be used to improve HPV-related policy and assess the effectiveness of the HPV vaccination.