Influence of TNFα and IL-10 polymorphisms on HPV-related cervical carcinogenesis risk among southern Moroccan women

Persistent high-risk human papillomavirus (HR-HPV) infection is a necessary but not sufficient cause of cervical cancer development. Growing evidences associate genetic polymorphisms in inflammation-related genes, as well as environmental cofactors with cervical cancer susceptibility. We aimed to investigate the possible association between cytokine polymorphisms (Tumor Necrosis Factor-α (TNF-α) and Interleukin-10 (IL-10)), tobacco consumption and the use of oral contraceptives with susceptibility to progression toward cervical cancer in women carrying HPV infection from the southern regions of Morocco. For this purpose, we selected a total of 339 women. The patients gave their written consent to provide a biological sample and to respond to a clinical questionnaire. HPV detection and genotyping was carried out using nested PCR and Sanger sequencing, respectively. In the same time the genotyping of polymorphism within the IL-10 (−592C > A and − 819C > T) and TNF-α (−308 G > A) was performed using PCR-RFLP. For the assessed TNF-α 308 G > A polymorphism and HPV-18 infection, the distribution of allele frequencies has showed a statistically significant difference between case and control groups (p = 0.03), with a significant association between the AA genotype and increased high-risk HPV-related cervical carcinogenesis risk (p = 0.01). The present data showed that the use of oral contraceptives and tobacco consumption were strongly associated with the AA genotype in the TNF-α 308 G > A among HPV-18 infected women (OR = 17.4, p = 0.01). By contrast, no apparent association was found between IL-10 polymorphisms and HPV/HPV-16/HPV-18 associated susceptibility to progression toward cervical cancer. In addition, women carrying the ATG haplotype had an increased risk of cervical cancer development when infected with HPV and a decreased risk when having the ATA haplotype. We concluded that the synergistic effect of environmental and genetic associated risk factors alongside the persistent infection with high-risk HPV genotypes represent a risk of cervical carcinogenesis among women in Morocco. •A positive association was found between TNF-α 308 G>A polymorphism and HPV- related cervical carcinogenesis risk among HPV-18 infected women.•IL-10 polymorphisms show no link toand susceptibility to HPV- related cervical carcinogenesis within the HPV+/HPV-16+/HPV-18+ infected women.•ATG haplotype increases cervical cancer risk in HPV infected women; ATA haplotype decreases i