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Abstract
Aim: The present study was carried out to assess the prevalence of hepatitis C virus (HCV) in relation to sex, age, promotive factors, associated symptoms and season among human urban population of Multan, Pakistan for a period of 28 months from June 2003 - October 2005. Method: The present study was based on the data, collected randomly from the human population aging from 1-72 years. The population was divided into three age groups i.e old (age above 50 years), mature (age 13-50 years) and young (age below 13 years). Results: The results from the present study suggested that among the observed urban population of Multan (n= 1166), prevalence of HCV was (6.68%). The prevalence of HCV when studied in different age groups of both sexes, it was found that prevalence of HCV was maximum (8.92%) in mature males as compared to young males (6.66%) and old males (7.69%). The prevalence of hepatitis C was higher (5.68%) in old females as compared to mature females (5.03%) and young females (5.17%). Conclusion: The main promotive factors for HCV were contaminated barber, parlor tools (23.07%), unscreened blood transfusion (17.94%), contaminated dentist equipments (17.94%), infected syringes (15.38%), and contaminated surgery equipment (12.82%). The reported cases of HCV positive patients were maximum in summer (76.92%) as compared to (23.07%) in winter
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This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Article Type: Original Article
EUR J GEN MED, Volume 6, Issue 2, April 2009, 94-98
https://doi.org/10.29333/ejgm/82647
Publication date: 15 Apr 2009
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Article Downloads: 1327
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