Prevalence of HBV infection among the healthy Nepalese males: a serological survey.

Sera from 478 healthy Nepalese male population, inhabiting various districts of five development regions of Nepal were collected from October 1996 to March 1997 and examined for the presence of HBsAg by third generation ELISA and Latex agglutination test in the laboratory of Central Department of Microbiology, Tribhuvan University, Kirtipur. The surface antigen was detected by ELISA in 4.0% (19/478) of subjects studied. However, different results were obtained in Latex agglutination test. The correlation between the results obtained from these two different tests is statistically significant (chi2=85.11, P<0.05). The results obtained from ELISA showed the probability of Nepal to fall in WHO category of intermediate endemicity zone for hepatitis B infection. The percent positivity of HBsAg was found to increase steadily from Eastern (2%) to Far Western (6.2%) development regions. Among the districts studied, Kailali district gave characteristically high prevalence followed by Rukum and Kaski. Other, districts representing for the prevalence are Sankhuwasabha, Jhapa, Ramechhap, Sarlahi, Dhanusa, Baglung, Gulmi, Palpa and Dang. None of the samples represented from Kathmandu valley were positive for HBsAg. The age groups of 16-20 years and 36-40 years were found to be associated with the hepatitis B infection. Furthermore, various percent prevalence of the infection were encountered from 16 to 40 years subjects and a single case was also observed from 63 years old man. All the samples recorded positive for HBsAg from ELISA were assayed for the amount of ALT as a liver function test. Where, 15.8% (3/19) of the infected subjects had impaired liver function, hence it showed that, the subjects with high ALT to be the possible carrier of the HBV. Conversely, the remaining 84.2% (16/19) of the total HBsAg positive subjects were concluded to have the infection either at incubation or at prodrome period.