Hepatitis C virus infection in infants and children from Argentina

GISMONDI, M. I.; TURAZZA, E.; GRISNTEIN, S.; GALOPPO, C.; MARIA VICTORIA PRECIADO

Journal of Clinical Microbiology

Año: 2004 vol. 42 p. 1199 - 1202

0095-1137

Hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection is uncommon in children, and its natural history is still unknown. Our aim was to analyze exposure to HCV in 109 infants and children in Argentina and to evaluate consecutive samples in 44 of them in order to study the outcome of HCV infection in early stages. HCV viremia, as determined by RT-PCR from the 5´untranslated region, showed continuously positive, occasionally positive and negative patterns during follow-up. Restriction length polymorphism was performed on RT-PCR positive samples to evaluate HCV genotype. Genotype 1 turned out to be predominant, while no patient displayed a genotype shift during the observation period. Perinatal HCV transmission was higher in patients born to HCV-HIV coinfected vs. HCV infected mothers (40 vs. 4.3%, respectively). HCV viral load was detected by means of the AMPLICOR MONITOR v2.0 kit. No correlation was observed between HCV viral load and ALT or AST levels, although we detected a trend towards higher levels among patients displaying consecutive positive HCV RT-PCR results. Our results demonstrate that pediatric HCV infection is characterized by high viral loads and diverse HCV viremia patterns, independent of both age and route of transmission in the population under study. Further research is necessary to determine whether the high rate of HCV replication is related to virus variability or to host immune response.