Specimen collection
At baseline and each follow-up visit, girls were asked to take self-collected vaginal swabs. The first swab obtained was for 16S rRNA gene amplicon sequencing (microbiome) using the OMNIgene vaginal (OMR-130, DNA Genotek, Ontario, Canada). A cotton tipped swab was collected to test for BV. The third swab was collected for detection of 