Cervical cancer

Introduction

In 2020, an estimated 604 000 women were diagnosed with cervical cancer worldwide and about 342 000 women died from the disease. The main cause of cervical cancer is persistent infection with high-risk types of human papillomavirus (HPV), an extremely common family of viruses that are transmitted through sexual contact. Vaccines exist that protect against high-risk HPV types, and screening programmes can detect signs of disease at an early stage, allowing for effective treatment and management of the condition. This means that cervical cancer should be one of the most preventable and treatable forms of cancer. In many high-income countries, this is the case. High incidence rates and high mortality rates of cervical cancer occur mainly (~90% for both) in low- and middle-income countries.

News & Events

News

Researchers from IARC and partners find that almost 7 in 10 premature cancer deaths in women could have been prevented

Press Releases

Press Release

CanScreen5: a global data repository for breast, cervical, and colorectal cancer screening programmes

Go to PDF 27.04.2023

21.04.2023 New HPV vaccines and fewer doses: promising recent developments towards eliminating cervical cancer (IARC Evidence Summary Brief No. 4)

03.03.2023 Launch of new IARC atlas: Using HPV tests for cervical cancer screening and managing HPV-positive women – a practical online guide

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Highlights

IARC marks Cervical Cancer Awareness Month 2023

Videos

Recording

Dr Partha Basu on the new IARC atlas: a practical online guide for using HPV tests

WATCH VIDEO 03.03.2023

15.02.2023 Performance of standardised colposcopy to detect cervical precancer and cancer for triage of women testing positive for human papillomavirus: results from the ESTAMPA multicentric screening study

03.02.2023 Dr Farida Selmouni on the Care4Afrique project

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Infographics

Infographic

Launch of the EASTER project to validate new technologies for cervical cancer screening and diagnosis

IARC Handbooks of Cancer Prevention Volume 18:
Evaluation of cervical cancer screening methods

What is the IARC Handbooks series?

What are the key results from this evaluation?

What is new in terms of the evaluation and in terms of the results in this new volume of the IARC Handbooks?

25.01.2021 Cervical Cancer Awareness Month 2021
Questions and Answers (Q&A)

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Research Project Websites

Global Cancer Observatory