Downloaded from www.microbiologyresearch.org by IP: 54.159.49.113 On: Sat, 10 Sep 2016 05:56:25 Antibody responses to 26 skin human papillomavirus types in the Netherlands, Italy and Australia Tim Waterboer, 1 Rachel Neale, 2 Kristina M. Michael, 1 Peter Sehr, 1 3 Maurits N. C. de Koning, 3,4 So ¨ nke J. Weißenborn, 5 Francesca Sampogna, 6 Damiano Abeni, 6 Adele C. Green, 2 Jan Nico Bouwes Bavinck, 7 Michael Pawlita 1 and the EPI-HPV-UV-CA Group4 Correspondence Tim Waterboer t.waterboer@dkfz.de 1 Department of Genome Modifications and Carcinogenesis, Infections and Cancer Program, German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ), Heidelberg, Germany 2 Queensland Institute of Medical Research, Brisbane, Australia 3 DDL Diagnostic Laboratory, Voorburg, The Netherlands 4 Department of Medical Microbiology, Center of Infectious Diseases, Leiden University Medical Center, Leiden, The Netherlands 5 Institute of Virology, University of Cologne, Cologne, Germany 6 Istituto Dermopatico dell’Immacolata IDI-IRCCS, Rome, Italy 7 Department of Dermatology, Leiden University Medical Center, Leiden, The Netherlands Received 29 January 2009 Accepted 17 April 2009 Solar UV radiation is the main risk factor for cutaneous squamous cell carcinoma (SCC), but infections with skin human papillomavirus (HPV) types have also been linked to the development of SCC. Little is known about the natural history of these infections and whether the seroprevalence of skin HPV types is affected by ambient or individual levels of sun exposure. This study investigated this by analysing sera for antibodies to 26 skin HPV types from five phylogenetic genera obtained from 807 healthy individuals from the Netherlands, Italy and Australia, countries with strong differences in sunlight intensity. Overall HPV seroprevalence was similar across the three countries (50–57 % for b-HPV types, 40–48 % for c-HPV types), and the most frequent b-HPV and c-HPV types were the same in all countries. The highest seroprevalences for 24 of the 26 skin HPV types were observed in Italy (14 types) and Australia (ten types). Seroprevalence among men was generally higher than among women, and the male sex was significantly associated with both b-HPV [odds ratio (OR) 2.81, 95 % confidence interval (CI) 1.64–4.82] and c-HPV (OR 2.42, 95 % CI 1.40–4.18) antibodies in Australia. The only measure of sun sensitivity or UV exposure significantly associated with skin HPV seroprevalence was found for weekend sun exposure in Australia and b-HPV antibodies. It was concluded that type spectra and HPV seroprevalence are similar in countries with different sunlight intensity, and that levels of UV exposure do not play a strong role in the development of skin HPV antibodies in this study population. INTRODUCTION Papillomaviruses (PVs) constitute a family of small, non- enveloped, double-stranded DNA viruses. One hundred and eighteen different virus types have been fully characterized, of which almost 100 infect humans (de Villiers et al., 2004), but more recent analyses have revealed a large number of putatively novel types (Forslund, 2007). Based on the open reading frame encoding the major capsid protein, L1, PVs are phylogenetically classified into genera (.40 % nucleotide sequence diversity), species (30– 40 % nucleotide sequence diversity) and types (10–30 % nucleotide sequence diversity). There are five genera encompassing human PVs (HPVs): Alpha-, Beta-, Gamma-, Mu- and Nupapillomavirus. 3Present address: Joint DKFZ–EMBL Chemical Biology Core Facility, European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL), Heidelberg, Germany. 4Members are listed in the Acknowledgements. Journal of General Virology (2009), 90, 1986–1998 DOI 10.1099/vir.0.010637-0 1986 010637 G 2009 SGM Printed in Great Britain