Unexpected high prevalence of hepatitis B and HIV infections in Malian medical students

Excerpt

Hepatitis B virus (HBV) persistently infects 350 million people worldwide. In particular, sub-Saharan Africa and Southeast Asia sustain a high level of endemicity. In the study reported here, 152 sera were obtained on a voluntary basis from 152 healthy students of the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Bamako, Mali, for hepatitis B diagnosis and HIV serological testing. Among these students, 128 (84%) were found to have evidence of HBV contact, as determined by total antibodies to the HBV core antigen (anti-HBc), and 84 (55%) of them were also positive for HBsAg (AXSYM core, AXSYM HBs Ag V2; Abbott Laboratories, Rungis, France). DNA-positive results (>200 copies/ml, Cobas Amplicor HBV Monitor test; Roche Diagnostics, Meylan, France) were obtained for 38 of the 152 (25%) sera. Two sera with low copy numbers of DNA (222 and 270 copies/ml) were HBsAg negative, bringing the number of chronically infected individuals to 86 (57%). …