PREVALENCE OF HEPATITIS G VIRUS

庚型肝炎病毒（HGV）是最近发现的一种RNA病毒， 通过肠道外接触血液和血液制品传播，以及 可能与人类临床肝炎有关。的目标 本研究旨在探讨丙型肝炎病毒感染者中庚型肝炎病毒（HGV）的感染情况 个体和HCV污染的免疫球蛋白静脉注射（IGIV） 产品.不同套式引物，特异于5'端， HGV的非编码区，设计并反向测试 转录和聚合酶链反应（RT-PCR）测定。该组 使用发现在检测HGV中最有效的引物， 测试来自慢性感染HCV阳性的血清样品（HCV2.0ELISA， RIBA 2.0和HCV RNA阳性）患者和6个HCV RNA阳性IGIV批次。 PCR产物的HGV特异性通过测序证实， 与已发表的HGV序列进行比对。 检测到HGV RNA 在50例HCV感染患者血清样品中的14例（28%）中， 6个（33%）IGIV批次。这些结果表明HGV RNA是相当普遍的 在HCV阳性患者中，也存在于一些HCV污染的患者中， IGIV批次。HCV和HGV合并感染的临床意义需进一步探讨 被评价。此外，由于IGIV的制造现在包括步骤 目前尚不清楚是否能抑制或去除某些脂质包膜病毒， 这些过程是否也对HGV起类似作用。

Hepatitis G virus (HGV) is a recently identified RNA virus which appears to be transmitted by parenteral exposure to blood and blood products, and may be associated with clinical hepatitis in humans. The objective of this study was to evaluate the prevalence of HGV in HCV infected individuals and in HCV contaminated Immune Globuin Intravenous (IGIV) products. Different sets of nested primers, specific for the 5' non-coding region of HGV, were designed and tested in a reverse transcription and polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) assay. The set of primers that was found to be most effective in detecting HGV was used to test serum samples from chronically infected HCV positive (HCV 2.0 ELISA, RIBA 2.0 and HCV RNA positive) patients and 6 HCV RNA positive IGIV lots. HGV specificity of the PCR products was confirmed by sequencing and comparing them with the published sequence for HGV. HGV RNA was detected in 14 of the 50 (28%) HCV infected patient serum samples, and in 2 of the 6 (33%) IGIV lots. These results indicate that HGV RNA is quite prevalent among HCV positive patients and is also present in some HCV contaminated IGIV lots. The clinical significane of HCV and HGV co-infection needs to be evaluated. Moreover, since the manufacture of IGIV now includes steps to inactivate or remove certain lipid enveloped virus, it is not known whether these processes also act similarly on HGV.