Hepatitis C virus detection in the semen of infected patients

Abstract

Though HCV infection is a serious public health problem, some aspects of its biology are still not well understood, such as its transmission through seminal fluid and sexual transmission. We looked for HCV in the semen of infected patients. Thirteen patients were included. Semen fractions (seminal plasma, leukocytes and spermatozoa) were separated with 45% and 90% Percoll gradients. The HCV-RNA in blood and semen fractions was extracted using the same protocol (AMPLICOR Roche) and was detected using the qualitative Roche Amplicor test and by agarose gel electrophoresis, with ethidium bromide staining. The mean age of the patients was 40.7 years. Risk factors for the acquisition of HCV included injectable and inhaled drug use in six (42.8%), blood transfusion in four (28.6%), and no risk factors in four (28.6%) patients. Genotype 1 was detected in 62% of the patients, followed by genotype 3 in 23% and genotype 2 in 15%. All blood samples were positive, regardless of the technique used for detection. All semen samples identified by Roche Amplicor and analyzed by agarose gel electrophoresis were negative. Among the 52 semen samples (total and fractions) identified by the Roche Amplicor method, 45 (87%) were inhibited. A negative result was recorded for one (1.9%) total semen sample, one (1.9%) leukocyte and four (7.7%) seminal plasma fractions. Only one (1.9%) sample of the spermatozoon fraction was positive. The results obtained suggested false-negative reactions for the semen samples.

Is sexual contact a major mode of hepatitis C virus transmission?

“…The possibility of sexual transmission of HCV infection is supported by the isolation of HCV RNA from semen and cervical smears in some studies 5‐7 but not others. 8, 9 Furthermore, although the sexual transmission of the same hepatitis C virus strain, as determined by molecular analysis, has been documented in some case reports and case series, 10‐20 the magnitude of the risk varies depending on the quality of the study design, the likelihood of unmeasured parenteral routes of transmission, and the level of risk behavior of the study participants.…”

Research needs for optimising wastewater-based epidemiology monitoring for public health protection

“…In general, urine samples provide lower sensitivity for viral detection, particularly in enteric pathogens such as Enterovirus and Parechovirus (.90% in faeces vs. ,60% in urine) (De Crom et al 2013). However, variability exists and for some pathogens shedding in other excretions may be the predominant source: the measles virus (measles morbillivirus) has been found in the urine of ∼88% of infected patients in one study (van Binnendijk et al 2003), and viral markers may be present in body fluids which also enter sewer systems (Crank et al 2022), such as sputum (e.g., SARS-CoV-2 )), saliva (e.g., human herpes virus (Fox et al 1990), Epstein-Barr virus (Niederman et al 1976)), semen (e.g., HIV-1 (Kariuki et al 2020), hepatitis C virus (Cavalheiro et al 2008), and Zika virus (Atkinson et al 2016)). This is particularly relevant when developing the sampling framework to account for differences where samples may be more heterogenous (e.g., buildinglevel surveillance; Crank et al 2022).…”

Fingerprint Biometric System Hygiene and the Risk of COVID-19 Transmission

“…Table 1 shows a partial listing of body fluids and secretions that can be deposited on or acquired from fingerprint scanners, alongside some of their commonly associated pathogenic isolates. Unconfirmed pathogenic association with tears, although chronic HBV has been found in the tears of children [29] Tears SARS-CoV-2 [30,31], filoviruses [32,33], HBV [34], HSV b [35], Escherichia coli [36] Saliva SARS-CoV-2 [37], filoviruses [33], Streptococcus [38], Haemophilus influenzae [39,40], parainfluenza [41,42], Mirabella catarrhal [43], Actinomyces [44,45], Mycoplasma pneumoniae [46] Nasal mucus fluid Staphylococcus [26], Klebsiella species [47][48][49], Pseudomonas species [50], E coli [36], Proteus species [51] Pus SARS-CoV-2 [52], filoviruses [33], HBV [26,28] Hemoglobin/blood E coli [53], hepatitis C [54,55], HSV [56], SARS-CoV-2 [57,58], Zika virus [59][60][61], Ureaplasma urealyticum [62,63], Enterococcus faecalis [64], alpha-hemolytic str...…”