ABSTRACT
270 volunteer blood donors and 100 workers [as a control group] were screened by radioimmunoassay [RIA] and reversed passive haemagglutination test [RPHA] for hepatitis B surface antigen [HBsAG]. The prevalence rate of HBsAg carrier state was 5.9% in the blood donors and 6% In the controls. None of these HBsAg carriers were positive for hepatitis B-e antigen [HBeAg]. However, 81.2% of the blood donor carriers and all of the control carriers were anti-HBe positive. The prevalence rates of anti-HBs were 40% and 32.1% in the HBsAg negative blood donors and controls respectively. Alanine minotransferase was increased above 20 U/l In 5.5% of the blood donors who were negative for all other markers used in this study. The significance of these results Is discussed Relative to RIA for the detection of HBsAg, the specificity of RPHA was 95.6% in both blood donors and controls, and its sensitivity was 84.6% in these two groups