Vaginal microbiota and human papillomavirus infection among young Swedish women

• Published in: NPJ biofilms and microbiomes Vol. 6; no. 1; p. 39
• Main Authors: Cheng, Liqin, Norenhag, Johanna, Hu, Yue O. O., Brusselaers, Nele, Fransson, Emma, Ährlund-Richter, Andreas, Guðnadóttir, Unnur, Angelidou, Pia, Zha, Yinghua, Hamsten, Marica, Schuppe-Koistinen, Ina, Olovsson, Matts, Engstrand, Lars, Du, Juan
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: London Nature Publishing Group UK 12.10.2020
• Subjects: 631/326/2521; 631/326/2565/2134; Biomedical and Life Sciences; Life Sciences; Medical Microbiology; Microbial Ecology; Microbial Genetics and Genomics; Microbiology
• ISSN: 2055-5008; 2055-5008
• DOI: 10.1038/s41522-020-00146-8

Human papillomavirus (HPV) infection is one of the most common sexually transmitted diseases. To define the HPV-associated microbial community among a high vaccination coverage population, we carried out a cross-sectional study with 345 young Swedish women. The microbial composition and its association with HPV infection, including 27 HPV types, were analyzed. Microbial alpha-diversity was found significantly higher in the HPV-infected group (especially with oncogenic HPV types and multiple HPV types), compared with the HPV negative group. The vaginal microbiota among HPV-infected women was characterized by a larger number of bacterial vaginosis-associated bacteria (BVAB), Sneathia , Prevotella , and Megasphaera . In addition, the correlation analysis demonstrated that twice as many women with non- Lactobacillus- dominant vaginal microbiota were infected with oncogenic HPV types, compared with L. crispatus- dominated vaginal microbiota. The data suggest that HPV infection, especially oncogenic HPV types, is strongly associated with a non- Lactobacillus- dominant vaginal microbiota, regardless of age and vaccination status.