Epidemiology of human T-cell leukaemia/lymphoma virus type 1 (HTLV-1) infections in a subpopulation of Afro-Caribbean origin in England.

Epidemiological studies on neurological diseases in residents of Afro-Caribbean origin in the West Midlands region of England have identified eight patients with tropical spastic paraparesis (TSP), all of whom were found to be infected with human T-cell leukaemia/lymphoma virus type 1 (HTLV-1). The husband of one of the patients with TSP was also infected with HTLV-1 and had a T-cell lymphoma. In addition, six asymptomatic HTLV-1-infected first-degree relatives of the TSP patients have been found. By anonymous testing of over 700 sera obtained from individuals of Afro-Caribbean, African, or Asian ethnic origin, seven HTLV-1-infected individuals were detected, who were all immigrants from the Caribbean. Overall, these numbers yielded a seroprevalence of HTLV-1 infections of 3.4% among the immigrant population of Afro-Caribbean origin, which is comparable with the prevalence of HTLV-1 in Jamaica in an equivalent age and sex cohort. Sera were tested for HTLV-1 antibody by means of three different procedures: passive particle agglutination test (Serodia), indirect enzyme-labeled immunosorbent assay (ELISA; Dupont), and indirect immunofluorescence test (in-house, using HTLV-1-infected MT2 cells). The results of all three tests correlated very well with each other. HTLV-1 antibody titres in TSP patients were on the whole significantly higher than those of asymptomatic carriers, but some of the apparently healthy first-degree relatives and one anonymously tested individual had titres as high as most of the TSP patients.