Transmission of betapapillomaviruses between domestic partners in an Australian community.

BACKGROUND

Betapapillomaviruses may be associated with the development of cutaneous squamous cell carcinoma but little is known about their transmission. One suggestion is that they are transmitted through close skin contact.

OBJECTIVES

To test this hypothesis we assessed whether co-habiting opposite-sex couples were more or less likely to share betaPV types than each member of the couple and an age-matched, opposite-sex control.

STUDY DESIGN

Betapapillomavirus was measured in eyebrow hairs of 57 couples and 114 age- and sex-matched controls. We compared the proportion of partners who shared at least one betaPV type with the proportion of control partnerships sharing a betaPV type. We further subdivided those who shared at least one type into those who shared only one and those who shared more than one. We tested the significance of differences in these proportions using Chi-squared tests. A case-wise concordance index was used to calculate the overall concordance of the partners and the control pairings.

RESULTS

At least one betaPV type was shared by 39% of the co-habiting couples and 26% of the control pairs (p=0.10). When restricted to all people with at least one virus infection (26 couples) 74% of the partners and 46% of the control pairs shared at least one type (p=0.02). The case-wise concordance index for partners was 0.28 (95% CI 0.21-0.35) and for the matched control pairs 0.16 (95% CI 0.12-0.20) (p<0.001).

CONCLUSIONS

Our results support the hypothesis that skin-to-skin contact is the primary means of betapapillomavirus transmission.