Prevalence of antibodies to hepatitis C virus in voluntary blood donors: are women better donors?

Background: Hepatitis C virus (HCV) is transmitted by blood and blood products and it causes a major proportion of transfusion transmitted hepatitis. It can lead to chronic liver disease which has great morbidity and mortality. HCV is responsible for more deaths than Human immunodeficiency virus (HIV). As no vaccine is available and as the treatment is costly and lengthy, with a poor success rate, donor screening remains a very important means of primary prevention of HCV transmission.

Aims And Objectives: This study was conducted to know the prevalence of anti-HCV in healthy voluntary blood donors (VBD) in a semi-urban region of western Maharashtra, India with a special focus on female donors.

Settings And Design: This was an unlinked, anonymous, retrospective study.

Materials And Methods: During January 2006 to December 2012, sera of 17976 VBD, which comprised of 16972 (94.41%) males and 1004 (5.59%) females, were tested for presence of anti-HCV antibody (anti-HCV) by using a 3(rd) generation ELISA test. Data was statistically analyzed by using Chi-Square for linear trends (Extended Mantel-Haenszel test). - 0.72732.

Results And Conclusion: Thirty six donors (0.2%) were positive for anti-HCV. Seroprevalence in males was 0.21%, while that in females was 0%. The positivity of anti-HCV remained stable over the tenure of this study (Chi-Square for linear trends - 0.72732). This region has a lower prevalence of anti-HCV as compared those seen in other states of India. Zero prevalence in women indicated that encouraging women to undergo blood donations would still reduce the transmission of HCV. Detection can be improved by doing better tests like HCV RNA detection and further prevention of HCV transmission can be enhanced.