Human papillomavirus and natural history of cervical intraepithelial neoplasia : clinical consequences

Cervical cancer is the second most common cancer in women world-wide after breast cancer. Each year, there are approximately 437,000 new cases of invasive cancer of the cervix diagnosed and more than 200,000 women die from the disease, 79% of which occur in developing countries. In the Netherlands approximately 715 new cases of cervical cancer are diagnosed each year with an age-standardised incidence rate of 8,6 new cases per 1 00,000 women. The age-standardised mortality rate for the Netherlands has been estimated at 2,4 deaths per 1 00,000 women with a total of 234 deaths reported in 1995. The average age-standardised mortality rate of developing countries is 2,5 f1mes that of industrialised areas.