The most common cause of cervical cancer is infection with human papillomavirus, even though not every woman that has the human papillomavirus infection will develop cervical cancer. The infection can be contracted during sexual contact.
There are other risk factors involved which are:
- A male sexual partner that has a history of many sexual partners
- Partner who has previous cervical cancer
- Previous sexually transmitted infection
- A previous sexually transmitted infection
- First sexual activity at a young age (younger than 20 years old)
- Multiple sexual partners
- Smoking
- Contraceptive pill usage