The ‘Hit-and-Run’ Strategy and Viral Carcinogenesis

The Role of Oncogenic Viruses in the Pathogenesis of Sporadic Breast Cancer: A Comprehensive Review of the Current Literature

“…There are three hypotheses for the mechanisms of infection [11]: through blood/lymphatics in a patient with previous HPV-positive gynecological cancer, by direct contact between genital and breast during sex through skin or nipple microabrasions, or by oral transmission to breast via bodily fluids. Another hypothesis for viral carcinogenesis is the so-called 'hit and run' mechanism, by which a virus may be involved in starting the carcinogenesis without integration into the host genome, and then subsequently cleared by the host immune defenses [12,13]. According to this hypothesis, the absence of measurable viral genetic material does not exclude its role in initiating the cancer process, and cancers that remain positive for the virus represent only a fraction of the whole; however, at the current time, there is not sufficient evidence to favor one hypothesis over the others.…”