Antibody response for L1, E6 and E7 HPV 16 and HPV 18 antigens in Tunisian women with cervical cancer and controls

Results obtained in the present work indicated that the Luminex assay is more sensitive than ELISA. The reactivity to the early antigens E6 and E7 was 37% versus 42% for HPV 16 and 21% versus 20% for HPV 18 among cervical cancer cases using ELISA. However, these ratios were 44% and 61%, respectively, for E6 and E7 HPV 16 versus 28% and 21% for E6 and E7 HPV 18 when using the Luminex technique. Data also indicated that HPV 16 and HPV 18 showed distinct profiles for the different antigens tested. Finally, the differences in antibody responses between cervical cancer cases and benign cases toward the different antigens were significant.