THE DEVIL WITH A THOUSAND FACES: HEPATITIS C AND ANTI HCV SEROPREVALANCE
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.8266762Keywords:
HCV, seroprevalence, anti-HCVAbstract
Introduction and Aim: Hepatitis C virus (HCV) is a hepatotropic virus and is an important cause of chronic hepatitis and liver disease worldwide. Chronic HCV infection, a public health problem, is a hepatic disease that can lead to cirrhosis and hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), but is also a systemic disease with extrahepatic manifestations associated with cryoglobulinemic vasculitis or chronic inflammation. There is no vaccine yet, as it can escape the immune response and change shape very easily, but HCV infection is the only chronic viral infection that can be cured. Our aim is to contribute to the diagnosis and treatment of HCV infections in the world and in our country, with this large series seroprevalence study we conducted in our province.
Materials and Methods: In our study, the results of patients who applied to primary health care institutions for various reasons between January 1, 2019 and December 31, 2021 and were asked for anti-HCV antibody testing were retrospectively analyzed from the Gaziantep Public Health Laboratory information management system.
Results: The number of cases tested for anti-HCV seroprevalence was 290 865, the number of positive cases was 1235 (0.42%), and the number of negative cases was 289 630 (99.58%). Anti-HCV seropositivity was highest in the 45-64 age group in total, in the 25-44 age group in men and in the 45-64 age group in women.
Discussion: The prevalence of HCV infection worldwide is about 2-2.5%. In our country, anti-HCV positivity was found to be 1.15% in a study conducted in 16 160 individuals. In our study, anti-HCV seropositivity was found to be 0.42% in 290 865 cases.
Conclusion: In our study, we detected anti-HCV seropositivity well below the world and country averages.
Keywords: HCV, seroprevalence, anti-HCV
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