Prevalence of hepatitis C virus related to liver diseases in Korea

Summary

The authors investigated the epidemiology of hepatitis C virus (HCV) related to liver diseases in Korea. Anti-HCV was studied by EIA in sera from patients with chronic liver diseases (CLD), individuals at high risk, healthy individuals, and family members of patients with CLD. We also evaluated the efficacy of a new anti-HCV assay kit, HCD EIA, consisting of 3 recombinant peptides derived from CORE, NS3 and NS5 regions of the HCV genome, for screening HCV infection. The prevalence of anti-HCV in HCD EIA was 15.4% of 1055 cases studied, while that in the anti-C100-3 EIA was 11.1%. The incidence of anti-HCV in HCD EIA was 5.9% of 17 cases with acute hepatitis, 18.1% of 293 cases with chronic hepatitis, 24.1% of 79 cases with liver cirrhosis, 28.0% of 100 cases with hepatocellular carcinoma, 19.8% of 81 cases maintained with hemodialysis, 31.3% of 16 cases with blood dyscrasias, 4.4% of 114 cases with fatty liver, 1% of 100 healthy persons, 1.3% of 150 blood donors, and 6.2% of 97 family members from 26 patients with type C CLD. Familial HCV clustering was detected in 3 (11.5%) of 26 patients with anti-HCV(+) CLD. The prevalence of anti-HCV in 190 HBsAg positive CLD was 8.4%. The relative proportions of positive anti-HCV, HBsAg, both positive 17.4%, 40.7%, and 3.7%, respectively, while 38.2% of the cases were negative for both anti-HCV and HBsAg. The prevalence of anti-HCV among CLD increased significantly in relation to age (p< 0.05), and it became higher than that of HBsAg after age 60. In conclusion, the prevalence of anti-HCV may increase with age, and it was suggested that HCV might be one of the major etiologic agents for liver disease in elderly group (> 50 y/o) in Korea, and its natural course might be similar to that to HBV.