Abstract
Background:
To establish effective preventive measures for hepatitis A virus (HAV) infection, a nationwide epidemiologic study on seroprevalence of anti-HAV and the disease prevalence is needed. The aim of this study was to analyze the recent sero-epidemiological changes of hepatitis A markers in Korea.
Methods:
The results of 11,068 anti-HAV total and 32,360 anti-HAV IgM tests by electro-chemiluminescence immunoassay (ECLIA) that had been requested in recent four years (2005-2008) to a reference medical laboratory from 1,699 institutions nationwide were retrospectively analyzed according to the distribution of year, sex, and age groups.
Results:
The overall positive rate of anti-HAV total was 62.8%. The overall positive rate of anti-HAV IgM was 11.0%, showing a significantly increasing trend by year: 7.7%, 10.9%, 8.9%, and 14.3% in 2005, 2006, 2007, and 2008, respectively (P<0.0001). The positive rate of anti-HAV IgM was higher in male than in female subjects (11.8% vs 10.0%, P<0.0001), and 81.8% (2,916/3,566) of the anti-HAV IgM positive results were observed in the age groups of 21-40 yr. The annual positive rates of anti-HAV total and anti-HAV IgM showed significantly decreasing and increasing trends, respectively, in the age groups of ≥21 yr.
Conclusion:
In accordance with a decreasing sero-positivity of anti-HAV total, the prevalence of acute hepatitis A virus infection has been considerably increased during the recent four years in the age groups of ≥21 yr. The results of this study could be used effectively as a basic data for establishing effective preventive measures for hepatitis A including vaccination in these susceptible age groups.
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Table 1.
Table 2.
Year | Male | Female | Total | P∗ |
---|---|---|---|---|
2005 | 59.4% (382/643) | 58.0% (284/490) | 58.8% (666/1,133) | 0.6233 |
2006 | 63.4% (567/895) | 61.9% (454/773) | 62.7% (1,022/1,628) | 0.5570 |
2007 | 63.6% (729/1,146) | 59.7% (510/854) | 62.0% (1,239/2,000) | 0.0761 |
2008 | 63.9% (2,007/3,141) | 63.4% (2,018/3,166) | 63.8% (4,025/6,307) | 0.8967 |
2005-2008 | 63.3% (3,685/5,825) | 62.3% (3,266/5,243) | 62.8% (6,951/11,068) | 0.2922 |
P for trend† | 0.0761 | 0.0111 | 0.0030 | - |
Table 3.
Year | Male | Female | Total | P∗ |
---|---|---|---|---|
2005 | 7.6% (237/3,125) | 7.8% (189/2,428) | 7.7% (426/5,553) | 0.7810 |
2006 | 11.1% (465/4,186) | 10.5% (349/3,310) | 10.9% (814/7,496) | 0.4352 |
2007 | 9.8% (430/4,410) | 7.9% (283/3,606) | 8.9% (713/8,016) | 0.0029 |
2008 | 15.8% (1,011/6,399) | 12.3% (602/4,896) | 14.3% (1,613/11,295) | <0.0001 |
2005-2008 | 11.8% (2,143/18,120) | 10.0% (1,423/14,240) | 11.0% (3,566/32,360) | <0.0001 |
P for trend† | <0.0001 | <0.0001 | <0.0001 | - |