Abstract
SUMMARY OF THESIS* BASSIT, Leda Cattini – TTV: prevalencia e caracterizacao do novo virus de DNA transmissivel pelo sangue em diferentes populacoes de Sao Paulo.Sao Paulo, 2001. (Tese de Doutoramento – Faculdade de Ciencias Farmaceuticas da Universidade de Sao Paulo). TTV: PREVALENCE AND PHYLOGENETIC CHARACTERIZATION OF A NOVEL BLOOD-BORNE DNAVIRUS IN DIFFERENT GROUPS FROM SAO PAULO, BRAZIL Recently, an infection caused by a novel TT-virus (TTV), whichwas initially associated with post-transfusion non-A-G hepatitis, led usto investigate the TTV infection (clinic-epidemiological aspects,phylogenetic characterization and distribution of TTV genotypes) indifferent groups from Sao Paulo. The study included (i.) 138 childrenwithout history of blood transfusion or of liver disease, (ii.) 401 blooddonors and (iii.) 130 Patients with Bleeding Disorders (PBD). TTVinfection was investigated by PCR-based amplification of the untranslatedregion (UTR) and its prevalence was as high in low-risk groups (81-85%) as in PBD (98%). The distribution of this infection according tothe age groups only showed significant difference in the children group.Almost all the children aging 2 to 4 years (95%) were infected by TTV.However, this prevalence decreased continuously thereafter and reacheda lower prevalence of 47% in adolescents of male gender aging 15 to 17years. TTV DNA was also detected by a hemi-nested PCR amplificationdirected to the N22 region in blood donor and PBD samples; sequencingof these amplified products was also performed. Concerning PBD, ahigh frequency of N22 was found in 42% in comparison to 5.5% inblood donors. There was no association of N22 findings with ALT leveland epidemiological aspects in the prior group. Therefore, there was anassociation of N22 with patients co-infected with HCV, hemophilia Aand patients who had been treated with fresh blood products. Thedistribution of TTV genotypes was similar in both studied groups andgenotypes 1 and 2 of the Group I prevailed on the others. A less frequentGroup of TTV (Group II) was also observed in two patients. The TTVgenotype varied in the same patient when samples were collected in thecourse of time. The high prevalence of the UTR-specific isolates foundfor the low-risk groups indicates that the parenteral route of transmissiondoes not seem to play a major role for this infection. These findingswidely contributed for the epidemiological studies of TTV infection andfor its phylogenetic characterization in Brazil.
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