Hepatitis-B virus infection in India: Findings from a nationally representative serosurvey, 2017-18

• Published in: International journal of infectious diseases 2020-11, Vol.100, p.455-460
• Main Authors: Murhekar, Manoj V., Santhosh Kumar, Muthusamy, Kamaraj, P., Khan, Siraj Ahmed, Allam, Ramesh Reddy, Barde, Pradip, Dwibedi, Bhagirathi, Kanungo, Suman, Mohan, Uday, Mohanty, Suman Sundar, Roy, Subarna, Sagar, Vivek, Savargaonkar, Deepali, Tandale, Babasaheb V., Topno, Roshan Kamal, Girish Kumar, C.P., Sabarinathan, R., Bitragunta, Sailaja, Grover, Gagandeep Singh, Lakshmi, P.V.M., Mishra, Chandra Mauli, Sadhukhan, Provash, Sahoo, Prakash Kumar, Singh, S.K., Yadav, Chander Prakash, Kumar, Rajesh, Dutta, Shanta, Toteja, G.S., Gupta, Nivedita, Mehendale, Sanjay M., Karunakaran, T., Jose, Annamma, Augustine, D., Govindhasamy, C., Daniel Rajasekar, T., Jeyakumar, A., Suresh, A., Ashok Kumar, P., Sivakumar, R., Banerjee John, J.W.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Adolescent; Child; Child, Preschool; Female; Hepatitis B - blood; Hepatitis B - epidemiology; Hepatitis B - immunology; Hepatitis B - virology; Hepatitis B Antibodies - blood; Hepatitis B Surface Antigens - blood; Hepatitis B Surface Antigens - immunology; Hepatitis B Vaccines - administration & dosage; Hepatitis B Vaccines - immunology; Hepatitis B virus - genetics; Hepatitis B virus - immunology; Hepatitis-B; Humans; Immunization Programs; India; India - epidemiology; Infant; Male; Prevalence; Seroepidemiologic Studies; Vaccine
• ISSN: 1201-9712; 1878-3511
• DOI: 10.1016/j.ijid.2020.08.084

•Our study indicates a low prevalence of chronic hepatitis B virus infection among children in India.•A higher proportion of children born after introduction of HB vaccine had serological evidence of HB vaccination compared to those born before vaccine introduction.•Of the 906 children aged 5 years, eleven (1.21%) were positive for HBsAg. India introduced a hepatitis-B (HB) vaccine in the Universal Immunization Program in 2002–2003 on a pilot basis, expanded to ten states in 2007–2008 (phase-1), and the entire country in 2011–2012 (phase-2). We tested sera from a nationally representative serosurvey conducted duing 2017, to estimate the seroprevalence of different markers of HB infection among children aged 5–17 years in India and to assess the impact of vaccination. We tested sera from 8273 children for different markers of HB infection and estimated weighted age-group specific seroprevalence of children who were chronically infected (HBsAg and anti-HBc positive), and immune due to past infection (anti-HBc positive and HBsAg negative), and having serological evidence of HB vaccination (only anti-HBs positive). We compared the prevalence of serological markers among children born before (aged 11–17 years) and after (aged 5-10 years) introduction of HB-vaccine from phase-1 states. Among children aged 5–8 years, 1.1% were chronic carriers, 5.3% immune due to past infection, and 23.2% vaccinated. The corresponding proportions among children aged 9–17 years were 1.1%, 8.0%, and 12.0%, respectively. In phase-1 states, children aged 5–10 years had a significantly lower prevalence of anti-HBc (4.9% vs. 7.6%, p