Women can take from a year to 20 months to clear a cervical HPV infection. This happens through their immune mechanisms. Most will never know that they even had the infection, and most will clear the infection. Why some peoples immune system does not recognize oncogenic HPV's as a threat is not well understood right now, but they are definitely in the minority of the population. The estimate that I hear at cancer conferences all the time now is about 1% of people that have an oral high risk (16) infection will have it progress to a malignancy.

But it is not good science to assume with these small odds that having an HPV16 infection will cascade into a cancer. My wife is positive occasionally for HPV16 and her system always eventually clears it without consequence. But this is not like getting a cold and having it go away in a week, it can take a protracted period of time. A four month window to expect you body to remove the infection is not realistic, this is common knowledge in the GYN community.

As I have posted at length on the boards before, the oral swish test is worthless, and the results mean nothing that is actionable. It just creates anxiety in people that will never develop a problem for the most part.