10th Anniversary Conference Of The British HIV Association [BHIVA] 15 – 17 April 2004, City Hall, Cardiff, UK

[AUTHOR(S):] M Dedicoat^1,4, R Newton², J Sheldon³, K Alkarsah³, I Szabados³, B Ndlovu⁴, T Page⁴, C Gilks¹, S Cassol⁴, T Schulz^3
1 Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine and Hlabisa Hospital, ² Cancer Research UK Epidemiology Unit, Oxford, UK; ³ Department of Virology, Hannover Medical School, Hannover, Germany; ⁴ Africa Centre for Population and Health Research

BHIVA Conf 2004 Apr 15-17;10:O9

BACKGROUND: The modes of transmission of HHV8 in Africa are unclear.

METHODS: To investigate mother-to-child transmission of HHV8 in South Africa, 2546 mother–child pairs were recruited from rural vaccination clinics and tested for antibodies against lytic (K8.1) HHV8 antigens. The HHV8 DNA copy number in saliva was determined for a sample of mothers by quantitative polymerase chain reaction.

RESULTS: In children over 1 year of age, the prevalence of HHV8 antibodies was 9% (54/579) if the mother was HHV8 seronegative, and 25% (103/413) if she was seropositive (odds ratio [OR] 3.2, 95% confidence intervals [CI] 2.2-4.7), and increased with increasing maternal antibody titre (χ²₁=48, P<0.001). 15% (145/978) of mothers had detectable HHV8 DNA in saliva (mean viral copy number 488,450 copies/ml, range 1,550–660,000); the prevalence was 10% (51/532) in HHV8 seronegative women and 33% (71/216) in women with the highest antibody titres (OR 4.6, 95% CI 3.0–6.9). The prevalence of anti-HHV8 antibodies in children was 15% (109/735) if the mother had no detectable HHV8 in saliva and 28% (12/43) if the mother had a high HHV8 copy number (>50,000) in saliva (OR 2.2, 95% CI 1.1-4.5).

CONCLUSIONS: We provide evidence of mother-to-child transmission of HHV8 and show that maternal saliva is a likely route.

PRESENTING AUTHOR: M Dedicoat

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Copyright © 2004 - British HIV Association (BHIVA) Reproduction of this abstract (other than one copy for personal reference) must be cleared through the BHIVA Organising Secretariat 1 Mountview Court, 310 Friern Barnet Lane, London N20 0LD