Two simultaneous hepatitis B virus (HBV) epidemics among injecting drug users and men who have sex with men in Buenos Aires, Argentina: characterization of the first D/A recombinant from the American continent

TRINKS, J; CUESTAS, M; TANAKA Y; MATHET, V; MINASSIAN, M; RIVERO, C; BENETUCCI, J; GIMENEZ, E; SEGURA, M; BOBILLO, M; CORACH, D; GHIRINGHELLI, P; SÁNCHEZ, D; ÁVILA, M; MARTINEZ PERALTA, L; KURBANOV F; WEISSENBACHER, M; SIMMONDS P; MIZOKAMI M; OUBIÑA, J.

Tokio, Japón

Congreso; The 8th JSH Single Topic Conference “HBV now in Asia” & Seminar on “How to be bioinformatics of HBV by International Database.”; 2009

Previous reports have shown that HBV genotype F is the most prevalent amongArgentine blood donors. Noteworthy, the distribution of this genotype is uneven throughout Argentina since it predominates in the northern part of the country (88.9%), in contrast with Buenos Aires city area where HBV/D and F prevails. HBV molecular epidemiology data regarding risk groups, such as injecting drug users (IDUs) and men who have sex with men (MSM), are still lacking in Argentina and scarce in the rest of the world. Bearing in mind both the emerging evidence of HBV genotype relevance in the course of the infection, as well as the lack of information associating a given HBV genotype with its route of transmission, the aims of the present study were to retrospectively assess the HBV genotype prevalence among the above mentioned at risk populations from Argentina and to analyze their genetic diversity and phylogenetic relatedness.