Simple screening test could detect cancer lesions in gay men

A Harvard study predicts that the use of a simple and inexpensive procedure, comparable to a Pap smear, would lead to detection of pre-cancerous lesions among high-risk, HIV-negative men and allow for removal of these lesions and early treatment of anal cancer. A study by the same scientists in the previous year reported similar findings for HIV-positive gay men. Anal squamous cell cancer and cervical cancer are similar diseases, both caused by a sexually transmitted virus called human papillomavirus (HPV). Up to 35 gay men per 100,000 develop this form of anal cancer per year, a figure comparable to the 40 women per 100,000 who contracted cervical cancer in the United States before the use of Pap smears. The new model, based on current clinical evidence, predicts that every two- to three-year anal Pap smear screening would cost about $16,000 per year of life gained, adjusted for quality of life.