Seropidemiology of Epstein – Barr virus infection among asymptomatic students of Islamic Azad University of Kazeroon, Southwest of Iran

Introduction: Epstein – Barr virus (EBV) is a herpesvirus which establishes a
persistent life-long infection in over 95% of adults world wide. Infection is
usually asymptomatic but the virus is associated with a variety of disease,
including nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC), Burkitt’s lymphoma (BL), Multiple
sclerosis MS, EBV-associated B-cell lymphoproliferative disease (BLPD),
Hodgkin and non-Hodgkin lymphoma in the immunocompromised host,
particularly organ transplant recipients.
Our study focuses on seroepidemiology of EBV infection in asymptomatic healthy
students of Islamic Azad University of Kazeroon.
Methods: In our descriptive study, the study group comprised 90 asymptomatic
volunteer students. All of them were at the age of 20-25 and selected randomly.
At the beginning, demographic data were recorded. For serological studies, 5ml
of blood sample was collected and the sera were isolated by centrifugation. For
heterophile antibody detection, monospot test was performed on the sera by
hemagglutination. Linkewise, ELISA was used to detect IgM and IgG antibodies
titer to EBV capsid antigen (VCA) and IgG titer to the EB unclear antigen
(EBNA) and early antigen (EA) ELISA results were recorded at 450mm optical
density (OD). Finally the results were analysed by statistical methods.
Results: Overall, EBV antibody was positive in 80 person (88.9%) out of 90
subjects and they had a previous infection. VCA, EBNA and EA IgG antibodies
were detected in 79 (87.8%), 80(88.9%) and in 2(2.2%) samples out of 90
subjects respectively. VCA IgG antibody was determind only in one (1.1%)
sample and monospot test was positive in 4(4.4%) samples out of 90 sera. EBV
antibody was not identified in 10 (11.1%) subjects. Also we didn’t find any
significant relationship between students with different sex, field of study, place
of residence and viral infection rate.
Conclusion: The overall incidence of EBV infection in this study was 88.9%
which is close to the observations in other studies on healthy individuals specially
in underdeveloped countries.