Maham Fatimah, Hiba Tehrim, Harram Fayyaz, Fauzia Sadiq, Sarwar Bhatti.
Seropositivity of Hepatitis B and C in Healthy Blood Donors at Ghurki Trust Teaching Hospital, Lahore, Pakistan.
Pak J Med Health Sci Jan ;14(2):371-3.

Background: The annual requirement of blood in Pakistan is roughly estimated to be 1.5 million bags1 . However, to meet such a demand many health protocols are neglected which give rise to the most feared complication; Viral Hepatitis. Hepatitis B (HBV) and Hepatitis C (HCV) infections are known to materialize very frequently in the general population. This is because their mode of transmission is through blood and its related products. Aim: To estimate the seroprevalence of HBV and HCV in voluntary blood donors of the local area surrounding Ghurki Trust Teaching Hospital, Lahore. Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted at GTTH, Lahore from 1st January 2019 to 31st December 2019. It was implemented on a total of 17914 healthy volunteers. All of them were screened for Hepatitis B surface antigen (HBsAg) and anti-hepatitis C antibodies (anti-HCV antibodies) by Abbott Architect Ci 4100. The male patients` ages varied from 20 to 60 years and the females` ranged from 20 to 35 years. Results: Out of 17914 volunteers, 17799 were males and 115 were females. 368(2.05%) volunteers were tested positive overall (HBV, HCV) out of which 150 volunteers had HBV (0.83%) and 218 had HCV(1.22%). Out of 150 HBV positive volunteers only 8 were females (5.3%) and the rest 142 (94.67%) were males. Conclusion: This study disclosed that the widespread presence of HCV is much higher than HBV in the population and males in general are the majority carriers of these infectious agents. Rigorous awareness campaigns, screening and health protocols are required to reduce the occurrence of Hepatitis B and C in the general population.

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