Study of the phenotype and allele frequencies of the ABO and Rhesus blood group systems in Algeria.

Abstract

The present work aims to study the distribution of blood groups in a simple random sampling and to present new national statistics on the phenotype and allele prevalence of the two ABO and Rhesus blood group systems. The study was carried out on a sample comprising 7549 individuals from the 48 Wilayas (Provinces) of Algeria. For this, a survey was carried out randomly, in hospitals, private laboratories, universities, university halls, Algiers Airport and social networks. The findings allowed stating that group O was found in about half of people with phenotypes (47.52%), group A was twice as high (30.14%) as group B (16.62%), and group AB exhibited the lowest frequency (5.72%). Moreover, a clear predominance of rhesus positive (Rh+) subjects (91.8%) was observed compared to rhesus negative (Rh-) subjects (8.1%) among the Algerian population. However, regarding the allele frequencies, it was found that the O allele was the most frequent, with a prevalence of 68.32%. As for the A allele, it came in the second position, with a frequency of 19.84%, and finally the B allele was the least frequent, with a frequency of 11.84%. The results obtained indicated that the Algerian population is heterogeneous; it is characterized by a high ethnic mix rate due to the migration of populations from all places (introduction of new parents) and to a very high percentage of consanguinity in certain communities due to consanguineous marriages.