Cervarix could achieve 20-year response; study

Results of three statistical models presented at the European Research Organization on Genital Infection and Neoplasia annual meeting, held in Nice, France, suggest that young women vaccinated with GlaxoSmithKline's cervical cancer vaccine Cervarix achieve prolonged immune response against the two most common cancer-causing human papillomavirus types - 16 and 18 - for at least 20 years.

According to the UK drug major, the three statistical models (power-law, modified power-law and piece-wise models) provide a robust and reproducible way of predicting long-term persistence of antibodies against HPV 16 and 18. All three models show that the levels of antibodies against both HPV types induced by Cervarix will remain significantly above those seen following natural infection for over 20 years, GSK noted.

"Predicting the levels of antibodies generated and sustained against HPV 16/18 is important as long as we have no better options to directly measure duration of protection," said Koen Van Herck of the Center for the Evaluation of Vaccination, Antwerp, Belgium. The models used in this study utilized data from an ongoing Phase II evaluation conducted up to 6.4 years, the longest trial of HPV vaccination to date, and will continue to provide findings on antibody levels against both HPV 16 and 18 for up to 9.5 years.