Analysis of cytomegalovirus and Epstein-Barr virus antibody responses in treated hemophiliacs. Implications for the study of acquired immune deficiency syndrome.

One hundred hemophiliacs were studied for serological evidence of infection with cytomegalovirus (CMV), Epstein-Barr virus (EBV), and hepatitis B virus. Ninety-eight percent had markers of hepatitis B infection, while 69% had antibody to EBV and only 42% had antibody to CMV, suggesting that factor VIII preparations do not transmit EBV and CMV efficiently. Seventy-one percent of those seropositive to EBV had an antibody pattern suggestive of active infection, as compared with 23% of healthy young adult blood donors. These findings make the patients with hemophilia an unusually favorable population for the study of the role of persistent viral infection in the immunodeficiency now found to be widespread in groups at high risk for acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS) and for the contribution of CMV and EBV to AIDS itself.