The distribution of HCV in subjects attending hospitals in Duhok City, Iraq

• Published in: Asian Pacific Journal of Tropical Biomedicine
• Main Authors: Nawfal Rasheed Hussein, Amer Abdullah Balatay, Alpay Turan Sezgin, Rana Saadi Jawad
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: Wolters Kluwer Medknow Publications 2017
• Subjects: HCV; Genotype; Iraq; Duhok; Arctic medicine. Tropical medicine; RC955-962; Biology (General); QH301-705.5; Arctic
• Online Access: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.apjtb.2016.12.003; https://doaj.org/article/bb2d97e90ef34549ae2819de7217e063

Objective: To investigate the prevalence of hepatitis C virus (HCV) and its genotypes in Duhok City, Kurdistan Region, Iraq. Methods: A cross sectional study was conducted to investigate the prevalence of HCV and its genotype. A total of 2109 subjects, who attended the hospital for complaints other than hepatitis, were recruited in this study. Results: First, anti-HCV antibody positivity was examined by ELISA. About 5.2% (111/2109) of our samples were tested positive for anti-HCV antibodies. To confirm the positivity, RT-PCR was performed. Amongst all samples, 2.8% (60/2109) was positive by RT-PCR. Then, we genotyped all the RT-PCR positive samples, and it was found that 50.0% (30/60) of our samples were typed as HCV genotype 4, 43.3% (26/60) as genotype 1 and 6.7% (4/60) as genotype 3. Conclusions: The prevalence of HCV was higher than that was reported previously and genotype 4 was the most prevalent. Further population based study is required to investigate the prevalence of HCV.