OK, time for a pop quiz: What’s the biggest cause of throat cancer in the U.S.?

Smoking would be a logical guess. So would alcohol consumption.

But both would be wrong. In the past 30 years, throat cancers have increasingly been attributed to human papillomavirus [pap-uh-low-muh-virus], or HPV.

HPV is now responsible for an estimated 60% to 70% of all throat cancers in the U.S.

So, another question: If you knew a vaccine would protect you from 90% of all HPV-related cancers, would you get it?

A new study from the University of Southern California shows that most American adults are not aware that HPV can cause throat cancer. What’s more, less than 7% of eligible adults have completed the three-dose vaccine.

Besides throat cancer, HPV can cause five other types of cancer, including cancers of the anus, cervix, penis, vagina, and vulva. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has estimated that 92% of HPV cancers could be blocked by vaccination.

The researchers found a hefty gap between adults’ knowledge about the vaccine and cancers the virus can cause. In 2020, less than one-third of the public understood the link between the HPV vaccine and throat cancer.

Much of the early talk when the vaccine was first used focused on the need for girls and young women to avoid cervical cancer later in life. Since 2006, there has been an 81% drop in the infections that cause most HPV cancers in women. In teens, the infections dropped 88%.

Men are twice as likely to get HPV-related throat cancer from HPV as women, the typical patient being a nonsmoking white man in his 50s or 60s.

Perhaps, the researchers said, it’s time for a concerted, man-centric push.