Occult Hepatitis B Infection and Its Role in Blood Safety: a Review

Background: Blood transfusion plays a great role in public health and the blood safety still has remained a main concern. HBV has been considered as one of the most prevalent blood borne infections. It is estimated that chronic HBV affects 350-400 million people worldwide. Comprehensive knowledge about HBV has high importance in Iran due to high number of blood dependent patients. Material and methods: The data used in this research are derived from articles obtained by searching keywords like occult hepatitis B infection, thalassemia, hemophilia, hemodialysis, co-infection and blood transfusion in databases including PubMed, Google Scholar and Scopus. The prevalence, genotypes, HBV-HCV co-infection, HIV-HBV coinfection and their role in blood transfusion and blood safety are discussed in this review article. Results: Iran is in intermediate endemicity region and studies have reported that between 10–60% of the Iranian population has the evidence of HBV infection, with 2-7% being chronic carriers. In blood donors the rate of infection is lower than general population. The occult hepatitis B infection is the main concern in blood safety due to transmission of the HBV via seronegative blood components. Iranian researches have reported a 1-2% prevalence of occult hepatitis B infection among Iranian blood donors. Conclusion: Based on our review findings the prevalence of HBV and occult hepatitis B infection in Iran is moderate, which shows the importance of taking necessary steps to reduce the transfer of infection via blood and its components. Keywords: Hepatitis B virus, prevalence, blood donor, safety.