フィルターによるＨＴＬＶ‐Ｉキャリア濃厚赤血球からのウイルス感染白血球除去 フィルター処理のウイルス感染能への影響

Abstract

Transfusion-associated infection of HTLV-I or CMV is mediated by the leukocytes in blood products. To know whether the leukocyte depletion by the filters could reduce or prevent the transmission of the viruses carried in leukocytes, we had filtered HTLV-I positive red cell concentrate (RCC) by Sepacell R-500 and examined the HTLV-I proviral DNA and infectivity of the residual leukocytes in the filtrates. We used the polymerase chain reaction (PCR) to detect proviral DNA with the primer for pX region of HTLV-I. HTLV-I specific DNA was confirmed in 2 cases out of 5 filtered samples. To investigate HTLV-I infectivity in vitro of these residual leukocytes, we used the syncytium induction assay in which HTLV-I infected leukocytes from carrier donors were cocultivated with the human epidermoid cancer cells (ME-180). We filtered 7 HTLV-I positive RCCs. Only in one case of 7 filter-passed leukocytes, we detected HTLV-I proviral DNA but no significant increased syncytium formation was observed in any case. The morphological damage of the cellular organella in the residual leukocytes was observed. These findings indicate that, although leukocyte depletion is insufficient for complete removal of HTLV-I from seropositive blood, the filtration may contribute to the prevention of HTLV-I transmission by cell damage during filtration and subsequent reduction of cell to cell contact.