Prevalence of blood borne viruses in IVF: an audit of a fertility Centre

Abstract

Objective The rate of infertility continues to be on the increase in the developing world. Similarly, the rates of blood-borne viral infections (BBVs) such as Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV), Hepatitis B virus (HBV) and Hepatitis C virus (HCV) are also on this rise. In 2014, the World Health Organization (WHO) quoted prevalences of 1.5% (HIV), 15% (HBV) 1.3 - 8.4% (HCV) in the Ghanaian general population. It has been reported that BBVs can adversely affect male fertility, specifically sperm count and progressive motility. The aim of this study was to evaluate the prevalence of BBVs in people with infertility attending an IVF clinic and whether or not BBVs impacted on sperm parameters.Methods A retrospective cohort study at a private fertility center in Accra, Ghana. We had 229 recruited couples assayed for HBV, HCV and HIV. Sperm parameters of the male partners were also assessed. The analysis performed included student t-test and Fisher's exact test.Results We found prevalence rates of 1.7% (HIV), 7.9% (HBV) and 0.4% (HCV), which is similar to what has already been reported in the Ghanaian community. There was no significant difference between BBV positive and negative subjects for sperm count (13.6 million/ml vs. 17.7 million/ml, P = 0.0599), percentage of progressive motility (26% vs. 30%, P = 0.2129), percentage of normal forms (3% vs. 3%, P = 0.0617) and clinical pregnancy rates per embryo transfer (36.1% vs 34.9%, P = 0.5) between BBV positive and BBV negative subjects, respectively. Conclusion There is a similar prevalence of BBVs in sub-fertile couples and the general Ghanaian population. However, no detrimental effect has been reported for sperm parameters on grounds of BBV infectivity of the male partner.

Sero-prevalence of hepatitis B and C viral infections in Ghanaian HIV positive cohort: a consideration for their health care

“…Kye-Duodu et al (2016) also found no significant association in HBV infection among PLHIV from rural and urban areas in the Eastern Region of Ghana but in the same study, HBV infection was found to be significantly higher in adults (≥18 years). In the Ghanaian general population, HBV infection was reported to be significantly higher in men than women [16] which is contrary to the result of this study. A study from Rwanda also found discordant relationship where older age was associated with HBV infection, but gender was not associated with infection [29].…”

“…HIV uninfected individuals) where the seroprevalences in most cases ranged from 6.94 to 15.8% for HBsAg and 1.84 to 8.4% for HCV [14–17, 19]. Only two studies reported lower seroprevalences, 5.5% for HBsAg [18] and 0.4% for HCV [16]. Comparing the HBV and HCV results of this current study to previous reports of studies conducted in Ghana and other sub-Sahara African countries [22–24, 26] it could be observed that HBV seroprevalence is higher than HCV seroprevalence in the Ghanaian population and the sub-Sahara African countries.…”

Managing and preventing blood-borne viral infection transmission in assisted reproduction: a Canadian Fertility and Andrology Society clinical practice guideline

“…In Canada, the prevalence of HIV is 173/100,000 population (Haddad et al, 2019). In higher prevalence countries, rates in fertility clinics were found to be 1.7% (HIV), 7.9% (HBV) and 0.4% (HCV), similar to reported rates in their general populations (Yakass et al, 2016). exposure-prone procedures even though infected, undiagnosed surgeons pose a risk to patients through bloodborne contamination.…”

HIV prevalence among 338,432 infertile individuals in Hunan, China, 2012-2018: A cross-sectional study

“…These data constitute the first report of HIV prevalence among the infertile population in Hunan, China. The overall prevalence of HIV during 2012–2018 in China was 0.04% (129/338432), a relatively low epidemic level, which is different from the reported 0.0046%(2/43274) among infertile couples in Royan[ 29 ],1.7% (4/229)among recruited couples in Ghana[ 30 ], and 16.8% of primary infertile couples (women, 24/135; men, 19/121) and 35.5% of secondary infertile couples (women,74/177; men,36/133) in Rwanda[ 31 ]. We believed that the relatively high prevalences in these studies are related to their small sample sizes.…”