Occurrence of hepatitis B and C amongst patients on antiretroviral drug therapy (ART) in a treatment centre in Calabar, Nigeria

The occurrence of hepatitis ‘B’ and ‘C’ virus amongst patients on antiretroviral drug therapy (ART) was studied. Two hundred (200) human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) positive subjects on ART and 100 apparently healthy HIV negative subjects (control) were recruited for the study. The subjects aged 1 to 75 years were screened for hepatitis B and C viral antibodies using hepatitis B and C test strips manufactured by ACON Laboratories. Questionnaire were also administered. CD4 counts of the subjects were determined using CyFlow Counter manufactured by GEM Laboratories, Germany. Fourteen (7%) of the subjects were positive for hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection, 6 (3%) for hepatitis C virus (HCV) and 2 (1%) for mixed infections. In the control group, a prevalence of 6 (6%) was recorded for HBV, 4 (4%) for HCV and none for mixed infections. Among the test group, subjects in age group 51 to 60 years had the highest prevalence rate for HBV (25%), 31 to 40 years for both HCV (7.3%) and mixed infection (3.6%). There was no statistically significant difference in infection according to age P=0.475. Males had a higher prevalence rate (9.1%) than the females (5.4%) for HBV, but there was no statistically significant difference in HBV infections according to gender P=0.404. In HCV infection, males had a higher prevalence rate (5.7%) than females (0.9%), but there was no statistically significant difference in HCV infection according to gender P=0.089. Subjects with CD4 counts in the range of 1401 to 1600 had the highest infection rate (50%) for HBV and 201 to 400 for HCV (7.7%) and mixed infection (5.1%). This work has shown that HBV and HCV are common among patients on ART and the need for routine screening of this category of patients in order to aid in the effective management of co-infections.