Combita AL, Reyes V, Puerto-Jimenez DN, et al. - Five years after the introduction of HPV vaccines in Colombia, findings from the catch-up cohorts, including virgin and sexually active women, suggest high effectiveness of HPV vaccines in preventing HPV 16/18 infections.

• HPV cervical prevalence was compared between 1,287 unvaccinated women and 1,986 vaccinated women.

• Vaccinated women showed significantly lower prevalence of HPV 16/18 infections relative to unvaccinated women (6.5% vs 15.4%), whereas a decrease of 63.7% was observed for HPV 6/11 infections in vaccinated women (1.02% vs 2.81%).

• For HPV 16/18, the adjusted vaccine effectiveness of 61.4% was recorded.

• Women vaccinated before their sexual debut showed significantly higher effectiveness against HPV 16/18 (91.5%), when compared with vaccine effectiveness after sexual debut (36.2%).