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Journal of Virology, November 2004, p. 12169-12178, Vol. 78, No. 22
0022-538X/04/$08.00+0     DOI: 10.1128/JVI.78.22.12169-12178.2004
Copyright © 2004, American Society for Microbiology. All Rights Reserved.

Identification and Characterization of Persistent Human Erythrovirus Infection in Blood Donor Samples

National Blood Service, Cambridge Blood Centre,¹ Division of Transfusion Medicine, Department of Haematology, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, United Kingdom,³ Refik Saydam Hygiene Centre, Department of Virology, Ankara, Turkey²

Received 29 March 2004/ Accepted 6 July 2004

The presence of human erythrovirus DNA in 2,440 blood donations from the United Kingdom and sub-Saharan Africa (Ghana, Malawi, and South Africa) was screened. Sensitive qualitative and real-time quantitative PCR assays revealed a higher prevalence of persistent infection with the simultaneous presence of immunoglobulin G (IgG) and viral DNA (0.55 to 1.3%) than previously reported. This condition was characterized by a low viral load (median, 558 IU/ml; range, 42 to 135,000 IU/ml), antibody-complexed virus, free specific IgG, and potentially infectious free virus. Human erythrovirus genotype 1 (formerly parvovirus B19) was prevalent in the United Kingdom, Malawi, and South Africa. In contrast, only human erythrovirus genotype 3 (erythrovirus variant V9) was prevalent in Ghana. Genotype 3 had considerable genetic diversity, clustering in two probable subtypes. Genotype 1-based antibody assays failed to detect 38.5% of Ghanaian samples containing antibodies to genotype 3 virus but did not fail to detect cases of persistent infection. This study indicates a potential African origin of genotype 3 human erythrovirus and considerable shortcomings in the tools currently used to diagnose erythrovirus infection.

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