Prevalence and Risk Factors of Hepatitis C Virus in Irula Tribal Community, Tamilnadu, India

Abstract

Irula tribes in india live in rural areas under poor infrastructure, high poverty, low education, ignorant on the origin of diseases. Although, their lifestyle made them vulnerable to a variety of infectious diseases. Only few studies have been conducted on them, hence, there is inadequate data about these Irula tribal health. Serum samples were collected from 372 Participants of Irula tribes from 15 different locations of Tamil Nadu. Serum samples were tested for Hepatitis C Virus (Anti-HCV) by 3rd generation ELISA kit and data were subjected to analysis using SPSS (version 17.0) and Chi square test to determine the risk factors of Hepatitis C virus. HCV prevalence was 5.10 % and this percentage was high among females than males with the age group of 31 to 40. Among the various risk factors, were statistically analyzed (p<0.05) with HCV infection. The frequency of combination of risk factors were found in HJ+A+IDU+SI+M (100 %), A+IDU+SP (100 %) in Anti-HCV positive Irula tribes of Tamil Nadu. High prevalence of HCV infection was observed among the tribal population with the various risk factors such as series of injection, surgery with or without blood transfusion, tattooing sexual promiscuity, migration, jaundice in family and intravenous drug use.

Keywords

• hepatitis c virus
• risk factors for hcv
• irula tribes of tamil nadu