frequency of human herepes virus type 8 among blood donors and post-kidney transplant patients in two specialized centers in Khartoum

ABSTRACT

Human herpesvirus-8 [HHV-8] is an opportunistic virus proved to be the cause of AIDS associated Kaposi!s sarcoma. Based on the emergence of HIV and its pandemic spread HHV- 8 is expected to participate in increasing the risk of Kaposi's sarcoma in areas where the rate of infection is high. There is a great need to study the epidemiology of the virus. To find out the rate of infection with HHV-8 in Khartoum among blood donors and post-kidney transplant patients. Venous blood samples were collected from 90 Subjects [60 blood donors from Elsalam Cardiac Centre [controls] and 30 kidney transplanted patients from IbnSina hospital]. The blood specimens were tested for Human herpes virus anti- IgG using ELISA technique. The overall rate of infection with HHV-8 was found to be 2.2%. The highest rate of infection [20%] was in the age group 46 years and more. The seroprevalence of HHV-8 was found to be 6.7% in post-kidney transplant patients. None of the control group proved to be positive for HHV-8. The rate of infection with HHV-8 was found to be relatively lower in the studied group.