Throat cancer epidemic is influenced by oral sex — Medical doctor.
By Admin
Throat cancer is reportedly on the rise in the US & UK with some experts pointing at oral sex as the cause.
Dr Hisham Mehanna, from the UK’s University of Birmingham, said 70% of cases of throat cancer are caused by human papillomavirus (HPV), a normally harmless virus that is spread sexually and has been linked to multiple forms of cancers.
Dr Mehanna said people with multiple oral sex partners have an up to nine-fold increased risk of throat cancer.
He wrote in The Conversation: ‘Over the past two decades, there has been a rapid increase in throat cancer in the west, to the extent that some have called it an epidemic.
This has been due to a large rise in a specific type of throat cancer called oropharyngeal cancer.’ Oropharyngeal cancer is the most common type of throat cancer.
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It appears in the tonsils and back of the throat. Doctors consider HPV infection to be the biggest risk factor for developing the disease.
