Cervical cancer mortality in ‘steep decline’ among young women

Key takeaways:

• Cervical cancer mortality declined among women younger than 25 years.
• Data suggest HPV vaccination affected the decline in HPV prevalence, cervical cancer incidence and mortality.

Cervical cancer mortality among U.S. women younger than 25 years declined by 62% between 2013 and 2021, a finding largely attributed to the wide availability of HPV vaccination for this age cohort, researchers reported in JAMA.

“Cervical cancer is completely preventable, and HPV vaccination is an important cancer prevention measure,” Ashish A. Deshmukh, PhD, MPH, associate professor of public health sciences and co-leader of the Cancer Control program at Medical University of South Carolina (MUSC) Hollings Cancer Center, told Healio. “While previous research suggest that HPV vaccination has resulted in a decline in cervical cancer incidence, our study is the first to suggest that we have now started to see the impact of HPV vaccination on cervical cancer mortality. This is an important public health milestone that signifies the importance of HPV vaccination.”

Researchers used data from the National Center for Health Statistics to analyze cervical cancer mortality for women younger than 25 years from 1992 to 2021, calculating mortality rates as deaths per 100,000 persons and age-adjusting rates to the 2000 U.S. standard population. They assessed trends in mortality rates over time using the National Cancer Institute’s Joinpoint Regression Program.

Between 1992 and 2021, there were 398 cervical cancer deaths among women younger than 25 years.

Cervical cancer mortality gradually fell by 3.7% per year from 1992-1994 to 2013-2015 (95% CI, 4.8 to 2.1), a decline researchers attributed to improved screening coverage and approaches. From 2013-2015 to 2019-2021, researchers noted a “steep decline” in cervical cancer mortality of 15.2% per year (95% CI, 21.9 to 7.8), an overall 62% reduction. The number of cervical cancer deaths decreased during this same period, from 55 in 1992-1994, to 35 in 2013-2015, to 13 in 2019-2021.

“Assuming that the trend from 1992-1994 to 2013-2015 would have continued, an estimated 26 additional cervical cancer deaths would have been expected to occur between 2016 to 2021, based on projected mortality rates,” the researchers wrote.

The researchers noted that HPV vaccination rates declined during the COVID-19 pandemic, underscoring the need to improve vaccination coverage among U.S. adolescents.

“Reduction in cervical cancer mortality among the youngest birth cohort who is likely to have benefited from the HPV vaccine portends how future generation across age groups could benefit from the vaccine,” Deshmukh told Healio. “We can avert mortality and morbidity due to cervical cancer, but continued improvement in HPV vaccination is important.”

For more information:

Ashish A. Deshmukh, PhD, MPH, can be reached at deshmukha@musc.edu; X (Twitter): @MUSCHollings.