HPV is the human papilloma virus, a sexually transmitted germ that causes cervical cancer, which killed about 5,000 American women in 1999. Unlike HIV, hepatitis B, gonorrhea and other microbes, HPV spreads not only through seminal fluid or mucosal membranes during sex, but also through the rubbing together of crotch and genitals. As a result, condoms don't guarantee protection against it.

While that's unfortunate, it isn't really news. HPV has been colonizing human nether parts for centuries. Rates of cervical cancer, the major disease caused by HPV, have fallen steadily since the introduction of the Pap smear in the 1950s.

The link between HPV and cancer was identified in 1979, but has only gradually become confirmed common knowledge. Newer tests for viral DNA have enabled scientists to find the virus easily -- and they find it everywhere. That awareness has given some social conservatives an opportunity to harness science to their timeless message about the wages of sin. On the floor of the House recently, Rep. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., warned that an "epidemic of HPV infection" was sweeping the country. And a recent article for teens published by the Family Research Council, a conservative Washington group, warned darkly that HPV "shows there is no thing as safe sex. Abstaining from sex until marriage is not the only right thing to do; it's the healthy thing to do." For the religious right, it seems HPV is the new HIV.

Coburn, a family practice physician and a fierce opponent of abortion, subtly inserted the HPV message into the Breast and Cervical Cancer Treatment Act, a bill that passed by a 421-1 vote in the House of Representatives on May 9. The bill provides an estimated $250 million over the next five years to treat uninsured female cancer patients. But Coburn tacked on two controversial clauses, which went virtually unnoticed by the news media. The first orders the Food and Drug Administration to require condom labels to state that they do not protect against HPV. The second calls for the federal government to make HPV infection a reportable disease within two years.

While these don't at first glance seem like particularly insidious measures, many scientists and doctors who work on cervical cancer believe the requirements could lead to unfounded panic and loss of confidence in condoms, ultimately increasing the rate of sexually transmitted disease. The Coburn amendments, these critics say, manipulate the science to serve a poorly conceived idea.

"The subtext is that Coburn and his supporters don't want people to have sex," says a spokesman for the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists. "They're saying, 'Hey kids. Not only will you get AIDS. You'll get cancer, too!'"

Women's health advocates oppose the new condom warnings, and are trying to get them dropped from the final bill sent to President Clinton.

Scientists estimate that 75 percent of sexually active American women will be infected with HPV some time in their lives. But "in the vast majority of cases, the infections go away on their own" without causing any damage, says Diane Solomon, a leading NIH researcher and former president of the American Society of Cytopathologists. Some of the infections have no visible symptoms at all; others result in a treatable case of genital warts.

For those reasons, says Solomon, it doesn't make sense to test all women for HPV infection. A woman's HPV status, in and of itself, belongs in the What You Don't Know Won't Hurt You category. HPV isn't a disease -- it's a common virus, with more than 100 strains, most of which appear to be harmless.

"If we screened everyone for HPV you would be telling a lot of women, 'You have this infection that's sexually transmitted and that, on rare occasions, leads to cancer. But we don't have a treatment for it,'" she says.

"You might as well report the common cold," says Dr. Robert D. Burk of Albert Einstein College of Medicine. "Are they prepared to have CDC hire 10,000 new workers to keep track of it?"

"To tell women that HPV is like other STDs is wrong and dangerous," adds Dr. Mark Schiffman, who is in charge of cervical cancer epidemiology at the National Cancer Institute. "You have to present the whole balanced picture. Scaring people will damage public health."

Coburn's requirement for condom labeling is also misleading, critics say. Condoms protect against many germs, as well as pregnancy. There is no good data indicating how effective condoms are at stopping the spread of HPV, but many experts theorize that condoms stop the virus at least some of the time. When it comes to viruses, dose matters, as do the mechanics of the flesh. In other words, the rubbing of external parts is less effective than the vigorous intrusion of a penis in a vagina to transmit the virus.

"Condoms are effective in decreasing transmission of HPV," insists Juan Carlos Felix, a Los Angeles cytopathologist who chairs the National Cervical Cancer Coalition's medical advisory panel. "If you block most of the contact you're going to reduce infectivity tremendously. In fact, if everybody used condoms in intercourse in the U.S., the cervical cancer rate would drop to nearly zero. Not absolute zero, mind you, but close to it."

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