| Your friend may be interested to know about the most recent guidelines published by the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists. It recommends that women should have Pap tests when they become older than 21 or three years after their first sexual contact.
"Sexual contact" means any kind of intimate manual, oral, vaginal, or anal sex play with a partner. The kinds of virus associated with cervical cancer can be passed through any intimate skin-to-skin contact. Pap tests are used to detect whether or not cells in the cervix are developing abnormally because they have been affected by certain kinds of human papilloma virus (HPV) that are transmitted through intimate contact. Early detection leads to early treatment and saves thousands of lives every year in the United States.
It is estimated that 75 percent of people who have ever been sexually intimate with someone else are or have been infected with HPV. Many of them are infected with the types of HPV that can lead to cervical cancer. That is why a gynecological visit with Pap test is so important.
| 
