Two years after diagnosis, 95 percent of those with HPV-positive head and neck cancers were alive compared with 62 percent with HPV-negative cancers, research shows.
Even so, the treatment can have serious and long-lasting side effects. Some patients end up disfigured; others have difficulty speaking or swallowing. Gillison said those with HPV-positive tumors might be able to survive with less-damaging treatments.
Meanwhile, the HPV vaccine has been a financial boon for Merck & Co., the maker of Gardasil, the three-dose vaccine approved in the United States in 2006 for females ages 9 through 26. Doctors recommend vaccinating girls before they become sexually active and can be exposed to the virus.
Merck sold $1.5 billion worth of Gardasil last year around the world. GlaxoSmithKline is seeking U.S. approval for a competing drug called Cervarix.
Neither vaccine is approved for males. Both companies are studying whether it is safe in boys and whether it would prevent genital warts and rare cancers of the penis and anus. But neither has plans to study whether the vaccine would play any role in the prevention of HPV-linked oral cancers.
"Cervical cancer is really the focus," said Liad Diamond, a GlaxoSmithKline spokeswoman.
Experts said they think researchers will find the vaccine works on HPV throughout the body.
"The way the vaccine works, there's no reason to think it wouldn't protect against oropharanyx [tonsil, tongue and throat] cancer as it does cervical cancer," Sturgis said.
Dr. Aimee Kreimer, an epidemiologist at the National Cancer Institute in Bethesda, said that, theoretically, the vaccine should work on HPV anywhere in the body but such discussion is premature.
"Before recommending the vaccine to men, it's crucial to determine if the vaccination works to prevent infection in men," she said.
stephanie.desmon@baltsun.com
