Persistence of newly detected human papillomavirus type 31 infection,stratified by variant lineage

Variants of human papillomavirus (HPV) type 31 have been shown to be related both to risk of cervical lesions and racial composition of a population. It is largely undetermined whether variants differ in their likelihood of persistence. Study subjects were women who participated in the ASCUS‐LSIL Triage Study and who had a newly detected HPV31 infection during a two‐year follow‐up with six‐month intervals. HPV31 isolates were characterized by sequencing and assigned to one of three variant lineages. Loss of the newly detected HPV31 infection was detected in 76 (47.5%) of the 160 women (32/67 with A variants, 16/27 with B variants and 28/66 with C variants). The adjusted hazard ratio associating loss of the infection was 1.2 (95% CI, 0.7–2.1) for women with A variants and 2.1 (95% CI, 1.2–3.5) for women with B variants when compared with those with C variants. Infections with A and C variants were detected in 50 and 41 Caucasian women and in 15 and 23 African‐American women, respectively. The likelihood of clearance of the infection was significantly lower in African‐American women with C variants than in African‐American women with A variants (p = 0.05). There was no difference in the likelihood of clearance between A and C variants among Caucasian women. Our data indicated that infections with B variants were more likely to resolve than those with C variants. The difference in clearance of A vs. C variants in African‐Americans, but not in Caucasians, suggests a possibility of the race‐related influence in retaining the variant‐specific infection.