Main

Tanday S. Lancet Oncol 2015; 16: e57

The age distribution of non-smoking, non-drinking females with oral squamous cell carcinoma 'correlates with the recent trend towards HPV-related tumours in younger patients' (Int J Oral Maxillofac Surg 2013; 42: 929–933). It has not been shown, however, that HPV vaccination prevents oropharyngeal cancer (Lancet Infect Dis 2012; 12: 82–83). This News Item reported on the substantive paper (see JAMA 2015; 313: 54–61) examining the link between HPV vaccination and multiple sclerosis and other demyelinating diseases. Such a putative association has been increasingly reported in the medical literature 'fuelled by social and news media'. This study looked at almost four million Danish and Swedish women, of whom 789,082 were vaccinated with the quadrivalent vaccine. The crude incidence rates were 6·12 events/100,000 person-years for the vaccinated and 21·54 events/100,000 person-years for the unvaccinated period. The adjusted rate ratio was 0.90 [95% CI 0.70–1.15]. A rate ratio of 1.00 indicates no difference, whereas a rate ratio of 2.00 indicates a doubling of risk