Lighting the way to an HPV cure?

On February 3, 2019, the National Polytechnic Institute of Mexico announced that one of its scientists, Eva Ramón Gallegos, and her team of researchers had developed a cure for Human Papilloma Virus  (HPV) infection, a previously untreatable viral infection. There are more than 100 types of HPV, at least 14 of which are known to cause cancers. HPV is the cause of nearly all cervical cancers, as well as some cancers of the anus, vulva, vagina, penis, and oropharynx. In 2018, approximately 311 thousand women died of cervical cancer, 85%  of whom lived in low- and middle- income countries. Vaccines for HPV types 16 and 18 are recommended by the CDC, but vaccination rates remain low, even in high resource countries, and even those who are vaccinated remain vulnerable to the many dozens of other types of HPV that are circulating. Finally, about 80% of the world becomes infected with HPV at some point during their lives. Because of its ubiquity and severity, a cure for HPV has been long sought after. 

Dr. Eva Ramón Gallegos and her team developed their treatment using photodynamic therapy. The treatment works as follows: doctors inject the chemical 5-Aminolevulinic acid into the cervix of women affected by HPV. This substance degrades into a fluorescent compound called Protoporphyrin IX, which accumulates only in cells infected with the virus. Finally, the cervix is exposed to a laser that interacts with the fluorescent compound to produce reactive oxygen species that kills only the cells infected with virus. Thus far, the team reports abundant success: hundreds of women who participated in the trial who were suffering from HPV lesions finished the trial with complete clearance of the virus. In preliminary trials performed in Oaxaca and Veracruz, Mexico, the treatment reduced patients' viral loads to zero 85% of patients with HPV lesions, and 42% of patients with cancerous lesions. In a follow-up trial performed in Mexico City, the researchers achieved a 100% success rate, completing clearing the virus for all 29 participants with only HPV lesions, and achieving clearance in 57.2% of patients with cancerous lesions. 

These results are extraordinarily promising, and yet there has been almost no United States coverage of this research. This breakthrough provides not only interesting science, but an example of what we may be missing out on when translating research between language, context, and culture. 

~Lisa Manzanete

References:

1. https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/eva-ramon-gallegos-hpv/

2. https://www.telesurtv.net/news/vph-virus-papiloma-humano-mexico-eva-ramon-gallegos-20190208-0016.html

3. https://cnnespanol.cnn.com/video/investigadora-ipn-elimina-vph-virus-papiloma-humano-estudio-mexico-pkg-krupskaia-alis/

4. https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/human-papillomavirus-(hpv)-and-cervical-cancer