PREVALENCE AND GENOTYPES OF HEPATITIS C VIRUS INFECTION AMONG DRUG ADDICTS AND BLOOD DONORS

Abstract. Hepatitis C virus (HCV) is an infectious agent that has the potential to cause chronic liver disease, cirrhosis and hepatocellular carcinoma. We determined the prevalence and geno-types of HCV infection among groups of drug addicts: intravenous drug users (n = 134), meth-amphetamine users (n = 100), inhaled-drugs users (n = 19) and alcoholics (n = 50); a group of blood donors acted as a control. The control group consisted of 179 randomly-selected anti-HCV positive samples: these were subjected to HCV RNA screening and genotyping. The anti-HCV test was performed by ELISA; HCV RNA screening was by nested RT-PCR that employed primers from the 5 ′ noncoding region. The genotype assay was based upon analysis of the 5′ NCR amplified sequences and RFLP. Hepatitis C virus was highly prevalent among all groups of drug addicts (12-70%). In 2000, among the new blood donors (n = 66,340) at the National Blood Center, Thai Red Cross, anti-HCV prevalence amounted to 0.98%. The HCV genotype distribution showed that the most prevalent genotype was 3a, followed by 1b and 6a. Our data demonstrated the very high prevalence of HCV infection in IVDUs, a finding that is consistent with the blood-borne nature of the virus. In order to curb HCV infection, a determined effort to educate both the general population and high-risk groups is required; such a program o