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Infectious Agents and Cancer

Figure 0.1: The accumulated genetic changes in an infected cell, leading to leukaemia

This section contains statistics on cancer and infections

Cancer is not in any sense an infectious disease. However a small number of infectious agents, especially certain viruses, appear to play a key role in causing particular types of cancer.

It is estimated that as many as one in ten cancer cases in the UK and one in four cases in the developing world are linked to such infections.

HPVs
This section describes how human papillomaviruses (HPV) are associated with cancer
Viruses and cancer
This page describes how a small number of viruses and infections play a key role in the development of cancer more>
HTLV1 retrovirus
This section describes how HTLV1 retrovirus is linked to adult T cell leukaemia more>
KSHV
This section describes how the herpes virus is associated with Kaposi sarcoma and others more>
Hepatitis viruses
This section describes how hepatitis viruses (HPV) are related to cancer
Helicobacter pylori
This section describes the link between helicobacter pylori (H. pylori) infection and stomach cancers
Epstein-Barr virus
This section describes how Epstein-Barr virus is associated with post-transplant, Burkitt and Hodgkin lymphomas and nasopharyngeal carcinoma
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In this section
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Overview of 2002 incidence data for the UK

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Elsewhere on the web
Health Protection Agency Infectious diseases list

 
Page last updated: 21 March 2006
 
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