HPV Testing to Be More Widely Available Throughout China

Free HPV testing will be given to underprivileged women in China, especially in less populated and remote regions.

Qiagen (Hilden, Germany) is expanding access to Human papillomavirus (HPV) screening in China through a comarketing agreement with KingMed Diagnostics (Guangzhou, China), China’s largest independent laboratory network.

The "gold standard" in testing for high-risk types of HPV, the primary cause of cervical cancer, is Qiagen's digene HPV Test

KingMed Diagnostics will function as a centralized lab, allowing smaller hospitals and those in less-populated areas to offer the digene HPV Test and send samples to KingMed Diagnostics for processing and analysis.

The agreement is a landmark for Qiagen’s molecular diagnostics franchise in China and its focus on driving growth in emerging markets. The digene HPV test was first registered in China in 2000 and is now widely available in many of the country’s hospitals and private labs.

Cervical cancer affects approximately 500,000 women annually worldwide and causes about 275,000 deaths each year. After breast cancer, it is the second most common malignancy found in women. In China, there are 80,000-100,000 new cases of cervical cancer each year and 30,000 to 50,000 deaths.

Cervical cancer is caused by high-risk types of HPV. An estimated 80 % of women will get an HPV infection at some point in their lives. However, in most cases, the infection goes away or is suppressed by the body without causing problems. If infections persist abnormal cells are formed, which may develop into cervical cancer if not detected and treated early.

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