Prevalence of antibodies against the hepatitis C virus among voluntary blood donors at a Makkah hospital

Abstract EN

One thousand four hundred and thirty nine voluntary blood donors attending the blood transfusion department at Al Noor Specialist Hospital, Makkah were screened for antibodies against hepatitis C virus (anti-HCV) by second generation enzyme linked immunosorbant assay (ELISA).

A total of 52 donors (3.6%) were anti-HCV positive.

Anti-HCV was detected in 1.7% of the Saudi donors as compared to 6.9% among Non-Saudi donors.

Scrutiny of the data revealed a higher rate of anti-HCV in the age-group of above 40 years than in the other age groups.

Further, when Non-Saudi blood donors were analysed according to their nationalities, Egyptian donors showed a prevalence of 27.2% of anti-HCV followed by Pakistanis (1.9%), Bangladeshis (1.9%), Yemenis (1.5%) and other nationalities (0.5%).

When blood samples from 92 patients on maintenance hemodialysis were tested for anti-HCV, 75 (81.5%) patients were found positive for anti-HCV.

We conclude that the prevalence of anti-HCV among blood donors in the Makkah region of Saudi Arabia is high and routine screening for anti-HCV should be conducted for all blood donors before they are accepted for donation.