DANGEROUS LIAISONS

As one who had laser surgery several years ago for removal of genital warts and who has discussed HPV at length with several doctors, I found “Dangerous Liaisons” (by Janny Scott, Mar. 11) misleading and alarmist. Creating awareness of the virus is important, but so is a proper perspective. The article hammered sensationally on the very remote possibility that a person with warts may develop cancer--and only quoted people whose warts were particularly troublesome and persistent, which is not the typical scenario.

HPV is hardly a threat like AIDS and is not even a regularly recurring, sometimes painful problem like herpes (which also has been linked to cervical cancer).

Unless they are incurable pessimists, people with HPV have no need to consider themselves “condemned to a sentence of life beneath the cloud of HPV.” About 97% do not have a virus strain associated with cervical cancer, and those few who do will not necessarily develop it. As for being “highly infectious,” this is true of the warts themselves, but surgical removal of them is extremely effective in a majority of cases; such removal is believed to be frequently permanent, especially when laser surgery is used. I have not had a recurrence since my laser surgery three years ago, and the only other person I know with HPV has not been troubled in 20 years since her cryosurgery.

If a patient whose warts are removed is responsible and vigilant about having examinations every six months, he or she probably would present less of a risk as a sexual partner than someone who is not monitored as often and may be unaware of an existing problem.

NAME WITHHELD

Los Angeles