Heart disease is the number one cause of death for Americans, killing more people each year than cancer and accidental deaths (the number two and three causes, respectively) combined. The situation in the U.S. is so dire that for its 2025 update, the American Heart Association (AHA) warned that someone dies of cardiovascular disease every 34 seconds—amounting to 2,500 people each day. Common risk factors for heart disease and stroke include high blood pressure, high cholesterol, obesity, and smoking. Now, new research suggests that human papillomavirus (HPV)—a viral infection that experts estimate will affect 85 percent of unvaccinated women by age 45—can also increase the risk of cardiovascular disease.
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What is HPV?
HPV is the most common sexually transmitted infection (STI), according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). It affects both men and women.
Most people with HPV have no symptoms, and in 9 out of 10 cases, the virus clears up on its own within two years. However, when HPV doesn't go away, it could mean it's a strain of the virus that causes genital warts or cancer (note these are two separate types of HPV).
As the CDC explains, "HPV is most commonly spread during vaginal or anal sex. It also spreads through close skin-to-skin touching during sex. A person with HPV can pass the infection to someone even when they have no signs or symptoms." Symptoms may not appear until years after infection.
To prevent HPV, use a condom during sex and get routine cervical cancer screenings (most women find out they have HPV through an abnormal Pap test result). You can also get the HPV vaccine, though this is typically administered in two or three doses between ages 9 and 26.
How common is HPV?
CDC data shows that 13 million people become infected with HPV each year, with roughly 36,000 cases leading to cancer in both men and women. A 2014 study published in the journal Sexually Transmitted Diseases estimated that 84.6 percent of women and 91.3 percent of men would acquire HPV by age 45 without vaccination.
While these numbers have likely fallen, the HPV vaccine did not become available until 2006, when many Americans were already too old to receive it. And the CDC maintains that "nearly everyone will get HPV at some point in their lives."
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A new study links HPV infection to cardiovascular risk.
A new study set to be presented at the American College of Cardiology’s Annual Scientific Session (ACC.25) links HPV infection with a "significantly increased risk of heart disease and coronary artery disease," reports The Microbiologist.
After analyzing data from seven studies conducted between 2011 and 2024, which included the HPV status and cardiovascular outcomes of nearly 250,000 patients, the researchers determined the following:
- Overall, HPV-positive patients had a 40 percent higher likelihood of developing cardiovascular disease. When adjusted for confounding variables (such as sociodemographic factors, lifestyle behaviors, personal and family medical history, and use of blood pressure-lowering drugs), the risk was 33 percent higher.
- Overall, HPV-positive patients had twice the risk of developing coronary artery disease, "a condition when plaque builds up in the heart’s arteries, reducing blood flow to the heart."
- HPV had no statistically significant effect on blood pressure.
"Our study shows that clearly there is an association of some kind between HPV and cardiovascular disease," said Stephen Akinfenwa, MD, an internal medicine resident at UConn School of Medicine and the study’s lead author. "The biological mechanism has not been determined but is hypothesized to be related to chronic inflammation. We would ultimately like to see if reducing HPV via vaccination could reduce cardiovascular risk."
How does HPV affect heart health?
The most recent study does not attempt to explain how HPV affects cardiovascular health (the authors note that more research is needed). However, one of the previous studies they analyzed did provide a hypothesis.
Published in 2024 in the European Heart Journal, this study included 63,000 young and middle-aged Korean women without heart disease. After being tracked for HPV for 17 years, it was concluded that those infected with high-risk HPV were four times more likely to die of heart disease, according to Harvard Health Publishing. (Not all HPV cases are considered high-risk; the most recent study did not classify cases by risk level.)
"Viral infections can trigger inflammation (a key player in heart disease), and that may explain the association, according to the study authors," reported Harvard Health. However, these study authors also concluded that more research was needed, including that involving men.
The takeaway:
HPV is the most common sexually transmitted infection in the U.S., affecting up to 85 percent of unvaccinated women by age 45, according to some estimates. In addition to being a risk factor for cancer, new research suggests that HPV can also increase one risk's for cardiovascular disease. However, more research is needed to understand how the HPV virus affects heart health.
