TY - JOUR AU - Nyale, Edward AU - Mosha, Fausta AU - Aboud, Said PY - 2011/07/18 Y2 - 2024/03/28 TI - Acute HIV-1 Infection in Antigen/Antibody-negative Blood Donors in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania JF - Tanzania Journal of Health Research JA - Tanzania J Hlth Res VL - 13 IS - 3 SE - Articles DO - 10.4314/thrb.v13i3.60615 UR - https://www.ajol.info/index.php/thrb/article/view/60615 SP - 281-286 AB - <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0pt; text-align: justify; mso-layout-grid-align: none;"><span style="font-family: ";Arial";,";sans-serif";;" lang="EN-US"><span style="font-size: small;">Fourth generation human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) antigen (Ag)/antibody (Ab) enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) test used in the current screening of blood donors at the National Blood Transfusion Service centres has limited ability to detect HIV Ag/Ab during the first two weeks of the window period. The aim of this study was to determine the prevalence of acute HIV infection among HIV antigen/antibody negative blood donors.<strong> </strong>This was a cross-sectional blood donation based facility study conducted at Eastern Zone Blood Transfusion Services in Dar es Salaam from December 2009 to April<span style="text-decoration: underline;"> </span>2010. Apparently healthy voluntary blood donors screened and accepted for blood donations were included. Blood donation screening questionnaires were used to obtain socio-demographic characteristics, history of past medical, sexual and blood transfusion of the study population. Blood specimen was collected for confirmation of the negative HIV Ag/Ab status by the Roche HIV-1 DNA </span><a name="OLE_LINK2"></a><a name="OLE_LINK1"><span style="mso-bookmark: OLE_LINK2;"><span style="font-size: small;">polymerase chain reaction</span></span></a><span style="font-size: small;"> (PCR) test. <strong><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></strong>A total of 552 blood donors with negative HIV Ag/Ab donated blood were included in the study. The overall mean age of blood donors was 27 years (18-54 years). About two thirds of the blood donors were in the age group of 18 - 27 years. Of 552 blood donors, 413 (75%) were males while 139 (25%) were females. Seventy two percent of blood donors were unmarried. About 71% were voluntary and the rest were replacement blood donors. The prevalence of acute HIV-1 infection by HIV-1 DNA PCR test was found to be 0.2%. It is concluded that many voluntary blood donors were found to be young, male and unmarried. Acute HIV-1 infection using HIV-1 DNA PCR test in the blood donors with negative HIV Ag/Ab donated blood was found to be very low. Further multi-centre study with larger sample size country wide is warranted to determine the magnitude of acute HIV infection in the blood donors with negative HIV Ag/Ab donated blood<strong>. </strong></span></span></p> ER -