VACCINE TO BEAT CERVICAL CANCER ; Injections for Girls Could Eradicate Disease and End Need for Smear Tests

CERVICAL cancer could soon be virtually eradicated by a new vaccine, doctors said yesterday.

The treatment could save thousands of lives and end the need for the smear tests which cause many women anxiety and discomfort.

The vaccine works against the human papilloma virus, which is responsible for nearly all cases of the killer disease.

Injections would have to be given to girls before they are sexually active, because HPV is transmitted through sexual contact.

Experts say the vaccine, Cervarix, could be widely available inside three years. Trials have already shown it to be 100 per cent successful against the two most damaging strains of HPV, which account for around 70 per cent of cervical cancers.

Its makers, GlaxoSmithKline, hope to modify it to extend protection against the other ‘high risk’ strains.

Cervical cancer is the second most common cancer in women under 35 and claims more than 1,100 lives a year in the UK. British doctors at four centres are among those involved in a huge international trial of Cervarix.

Dr Anne Szarewski, a clinical consultant at Cancer Research UK, who is leading the London trials, said: ‘It looks like the end of the line for cervical cancer.

‘It’s very encouraging and very exciting.

‘If you are able to protect against 70 per cent, you are able to seriously consider whether you need smear tests any more.

‘If we could get that to 80 per cent or more we could certainly stop smears.

‘No women like having smear tests. Many find the examination uncomfortable and don’t like having it done and this could lift that burden from them.’ Dr Szarewski, who works at the Margaret Pyke Centre contraceptive and sexual health clinic in central London, said experts hope that a series of three injections over six months could provide lifetime immunity although it is possible boosters will be needed.

Around 3,200 new cases of cervical cancer are diagnosed in the UK each year.

Four out of ten victims die within five years.

Nearly all cases are related to HPV. At least 50 per cent of women have been exposed to the virus, which sometimes causes genital warts, but most do not realise it because they have no symptoms.

The virus generally disappears naturally within six months, but in one or two per cent of cases it causes the abnormalities in the cells of a woman’s cervix which eventually develop into cancer.

Under the national screening programme, women from 20 to 64 are invited to undergo smear tests every three to five years.

A small number of cells are removed and examined for early signs of the disease.

If pre- cancerous tissue or a small tumour is detected, doctors can usually treat it successfully with either radiotherapy or surgery to remove part or all of the cervix.

In more serious cases, they may also have to remove the womb meaning the patient can no longer have children.

The screening programme, which dates back to 1967 in some areas but was officially launched in 1988, has been credited with preventing eight out of ten cancers.

But many women complain of feeling anxious and uncomfortable about smear tests.

Cervarix has so far been tested in a study involving more than 1,100 women in the U.S., Canada and Brazil.

Doctors in 14 countries, including the UK, are now conducting further trials in 13,000 women between 15 and 25 while researchers at Glaxo try to add protection against other strains of HPV.

The UK trials involve some 400 women at Dr Szarewski’s clinic, St George’s Hospital in South London, St Mary’s Hospital in Manchester and the University of Aberdeen.

A second drug firm, Merck Sharp Dohme, is also developing a vaccine and the two companies are racing to be the first to get their product approved.

Glaxo expects to submit an application to the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency in 2006 so Cervarix could be made available the following year.

Glaxo chief executive Jean-Pierre Garnier said: ‘Cervarix has shown great efficacy in trials so far and we are very excited about this opportunity to treat the number two cancer killer for women worldwide with a vaccine that could be available by 2007.’ r.yapp@dailymail.co.uk