{"id":7153,"date":"2025-01-20T17:11:00","date_gmt":"2025-01-20T17:11:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/momentsunfolded.com\/?p=7153"},"modified":"2025-01-20T17:11:04","modified_gmt":"2025-01-20T17:11:04","slug":"oral-sex-is-now-the-main-cause-of-throat-cancer-%f0%9f%98%b2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/momentsunfolded.com\/archives\/7153","title":{"rendered":"Oral sex is now the main cause of throat cancer.\ud83d\ude32"},"content":{"rendered":"<header class='\"entry-header\"'>\n<div class='\"entry-content\"'>\n<h2 id='\"h-the-main-risk-factor-is-the-number-of-partners-someone-has-had-oral-sex-with\"' class='\"wp-block-heading\"'>The \u2018main risk factor\u2019 is the number of partners someone has had oral sex with\n</h2><p>Oral sex is causing an \u201cepidemic\u201d of throat cancer, with the practice being more damaging than smoking, boozing and a bad diet.\n</p><p>It is now more common than cervical cancer in the UK and US an expert has said.\n</p><p>Much of this is due to one particular type of throat cancer \u2013 oropharyngeal cancer \u2013 which affects the area of the tonsils and back of the throat and is due to the human papillomavirus (HPV). HPV is also the main cause of cancer of the cervix.\n</p><p>HPV is the name of a very common group of viruses, according to the\u00a0NHS. It states that \u201cthey do not cause any problems in most people, but some types can cause genital warts or cancer. HPV affects the skin\u201d. There are more than 100 different types.\n</p><p>Dr Hisham Mehanna, from the UK\u2019s University of Birmingham, said people with multiple oral sex partners were more than eight times more likely to develop the cancer.\n</p><div id='\"div-gpt-ad-1676384532657-0\"' data-google-query-id='\"CMuqhZvN54oDFSuj2AUdlTM5iQ\"'>\n<div id='\"google_ads_iframe_\/247211819\/joe.co.uk\/joe.co.uk_in_content_0__container__\"'>\n\n<p>Writing in The Conversation, Dr Mehanna said: \u201cOver 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.\n</p><p>Medical experts have pegged HPV infection to be the biggest risk factor for developing the disease.\n</p><p>\u201cThe prevailing theory is that most of us catch HPV infections and are able to clear them completely,\u201d Mehanna writes.\n</p><div id='\"div-gpt-ad-1676904701130-0\"' data-google-query-id='\"CK6dip_N54oDFeFunQkdJCY2Pw\"'>\n<div id='\"google_ads_iframe_\/247211819\/joe.co.uk\/joe.co.uk_in_content_2_0__container__\"'>\n\n<p>\u201cHowever, a small number of people are not able to get rid of the infection, maybe due to a defect in a particular aspect of their immune system. In those patients, the virus is able to replicate continuously, and over time integrates at random positions into the host\u2019s DNA, some of which can cause the host cells to become cancerous.\u201d\n<figure class='\"wp-block-image' size-large><a href="%5C%22https:%5C/%5C/www.joe.co.uk%5C/uploads%5C/2023%5C/04%5C/Screenshot-2023-04-27-at-13.30.02.png%5C%22"><img decoding='\"async\"' class='\"wp-image-393683\"' src="%5C%22https:%5C/%5C/www.joe.co.uk%5C/uploads%5C/2023%5C/04%5C/Screenshot-2023-04-27-at-13.30.02.png?height=664&amp;width=1186%5C%22" sizes='\"(max-width:' srcset='\"https:\/\/www.joe.co.uk\/uploads\/2023\/04\/Screenshot-2023-04-27-at-13.30.02.png?width=160' https: alt='\"\"'><figcaption class='\"wp-element-caption\"'>The oropharynx is the middle section of the throat (pharynx).\u00a0Scientific Animations\/Wikimedia Commons\n<p>Dr Mehanna said, for oropharyngeal cancer, the \u201cmain risk factor\u201d is the number of partners someone has had oral sex with.\n</p><p>\u201cThose with six or more lifetime oral-sex partners are 8.5 times more likely to develop oropharyngeal cancer than those who do not practice oral sex,\u201d he wrote.\n</p><p>In the UK, 80 per cent of adults reported practising oral sex at some point in their lives, Mehanna\u2019s report states.\n</p><p>\u201cYet, mercifully,\u201d he assures, \u201conly a small number of those people develop oropharyngeal cancer.\u201d\n</p><p>According to the NHS, around 8,300 people are diagnosed with throat cancer each year in the UK, which is about 1 in every 50 cancers caught. More than 2 in 3 cases of mouth cancer develop in adults over the age of 55. Only 1 in 8 (12.5 per cent) happens in people younger than 50.\n</p><p>Doctors say that oral sex is the biggest risk factor for developing oropharyngeal cancer\u2014 more than from smoking, alcohol consumption, and an unhealthy diet.\n</p><p>HPV is a common virus spread through vaginal, anal and oral sex with someone who is already infected.\n</p><p>There is a vaccine, which is more than 80 per cent effective, and widely available.\n</p><p>According to previous\u00a0government data, HPV vaccine coverage in England for girls completing a 2-dose HPV schedule by Year 9 is 67.3 per cent. In boys, 62.4 per cent are double vaccinated.\n</p><p>Hollywood actor Michael Douglas revealed in 2013 that his cancer was caused by oral sex.\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"</p><p>The \u2018main risk factor\u2019 is the number of partners someone has had oral sex with Oral sex is causing an \u201cepidemic\u201d of throat cancer, with the practice being more damaging than smoking, boozing and a bad diet. It is now more common than cervical cancer in the UK and US an expert has said. Much [&hellip;]\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":7154,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7153","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/momentsunfolded.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7153","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/momentsunfolded.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/momentsunfolded.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/momentsunfolded.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/momentsunfolded.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7153"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/momentsunfolded.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7153\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7155,"href":"https:\/\/momentsunfolded.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7153\/revisions\/7155"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/momentsunfolded.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7154"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/momentsunfolded.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7153"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/momentsunfolded.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7153"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/momentsunfolded.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7153"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}</p></figcaption></a></figure></p></div></div></div></div></div></header>