All studies agree that cervical cancer risk is increased by early marriage, or by first coitus at early ages. Further studies now isolate ages 15 to 20 as the susceptible period, and also demonstrate that the event associating early marriage with increased risk is first intercourse. Speculation suggests a male contribution that becomes established in adolescent girls because they are then most susceptible. This agent may be a substance, organism, or particle not related to the ejaculate, perhaps borne on the unsanitary male organ or contraceptive, and remaining dormant during the mean latent period of 30 years before developing into carcinoma.