β Scribed by Chien-Jen Chen; Li-Yu Wang; Yin-Chu Chien
No coin nor oath required. For personal study only.
T aiwan is an endemic area of hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection. More than 90% of the general population has been infected with HBV, and the prevalence of chronic infection is as high as 15% to 20%. Liver cancer is the first leading neoplasm for men and the third for women. Its ageadjusted incidence per 100,000 was 48 for men and 18 for women in 2000. Malignant neoplasm was the leading cause of death, and liver cancer was the leading cause of cancer death in Taiwan in 2000. Deaths from cirrhosis and chronic liver diseases also ranked as the sixth leading cause of death.
Several early clinical trials on the efficacy of hepatitis B immunoglobulin and HBV vaccine in children were carried out in our country. A nationwide HBV vaccination program for newborns was implemented in 1984. A significant decline in seroprevalence of hepatitis B surface antigen and in childhood hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) has been observed among vaccinated children. However, 2 million adult patients are still affected with chronic HBV infection. The seroprevalence of hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection has been reported as 2% to 3% in the general population, with the highest prevalence of ΟΎ20% in several hyperendemic villages, where iatrogenic infection is the major transmission route. The National Health Insurance reimburses the treatment of chronic infection of HBV and HCV in Taiwan.
π SIMILAR VOLUMES
Three genotypes of HDV, which may be associated with different clinical pictures and epidemiological patterns, have been identified. In contrast to Type I and Type Ill HDV, both of which have multiple isolates, Type II HDV so far includes only a single isolate (Japan-1) from a low prevalence area (J