Smear test required, no sexual history?

[Scamperscamper]

Just that really. If you've never had sex or any kind of skin-to-skin sexual contact with anyone, do you need a smear test? Can you still be at risk of what they're testing for? I always thought tests weren't recommended for virgins, but I've heard the tests have changed now and I'm not sure how they're different.

Stunning lack of awareness of other cultures there.

I'm living proof that it also spreads in other ways.

I have looked up the Ghana research and it was 105 nuns from 3 convents and the research explicitly states that it is common in Ghana for women to enter comvents later in life after having had relationships with men.

How can you know you don't have HPV. You may have tested negative because it was dormant?

Having said that it's your right not to attend of course. I believe self tests will become more available soon so might be an option for you.

I agree with this. Having tested negative in past is no guarantee you're still negative. How horrendous that you had that trauma. It's your right to request a chaperone, but perhaps, given the circumstances you might be allowed to be accompanied by a friend? Or indeed wait for self testing. I hate the idea of sticking a swab up myself but clearly most people aren't bothered.

That's as may be but the article states that the nuns had not been asked about their sexual history. For all we know many of them could have been nuns from a young age.

I wouldn't want to do it myself - I hated doing it with Covid tests - but I can see who it will work for some people.
I don't think having a chaperone is going to be enough to make things easier for the pp.
For many women, the trauma of an invasive test is not worth their perceived risk of cervical cancer and I think we have to respect that, while encouraging most other women to go for their tests.

They are now going to send out the Hpv swab tests out from the Dr's now who haven't had a smear. So the people that have been buying them online can now get them free.

@Gwenhwyfar I hated the covid throat swab because I always gagged. The nose only ones were OK. I don't mind having smears but would be very anxious about putting a swab in myself. I hope they don't decide that's the way we're all going to be tested. I had to inject myself daily for 14 wks (blood thinning meds after surgery), and had no problem doing so, but as for pushing up a swab and trying to find my cervix ...... arrgh! I didn't suggest the pp should ask for chaperone, just that she was entitled to one, and therefore it shouldn't be out of the question for her to have permission to be accompanied by a close friend, partner or relative.

You don't have to find your cervix.

That's a very strange omission, isn't it? It pretty much invalidates the research for any useful purpose except to encourage Ghanaian nuns to have smear tests.

89% of them could have been virgin nuns.

The other 10.8% had been exposed to HPV with the overwhelming likelihood that was through sex, whether willingly or otherwise.

The incidence of cervical cancer in strictly run Catholic convents where people joined very young in Europe was always vanishingly low, it's a sexually transmitted disease.

Actually 23.8% had HPV. Sex is the main way the virus transmits but not the only way. It's known that it occasionally transmits in childbirth. It hasn't been ruled out that hard surfaces and contaminated medical equipment can be routes of transmission, and the role of fingers isn't understood - not just masturbation but inserting non applicator tampons or applying cream to treat thrush. Unwashed sex toys are known vectors, so clearly inaninimate objects can carry the virus to new hosts. Once you accept it's possible, you have to also consider that it may be more common than thought. There are very few women who are not in a position to have got HPV sexually. Every HPV pos woman who COULD have caught it sexually is considered to have DEFINITELY got it sexually, but in fact this does not make her immune to getting it in another, less common, way. The NHS takes a long time to catch up and change their stance. For years it was thought baby car seats were safe for long periods and pregnant women were told they could drink moderately. Eventually they'll find vaping isn't safe. So no matter what the NHS tells us, it doesn't guarantee safety for any women.

What percentage of the Ghanian nuns had FGM? I don't know how prevalent it is in different cultural groups there. That may have a factor as well.

Nevertheless it is almost vanishingly rare, "near zero" to find cervical cancer in virgins.

Studying HPV infection in nuns from convents in a country where it's perfectly normal to enter a convent at a later stage in life after having had sex in a country where HPV is rife is of limited usefulness, especially if you don't even ask them their sexual history!

To then extrapolate that to "nuns can get HPV" implying those nuns will be virgins, as somebody did up thread, is ridiculous.

Of course it's rare. Most people with HPV don't actually get cancer, so of course there are going to be far fewer cases of cancer than with those who have had sex. Doesn't mean the virus can't transmit in other ways.