This paper reports the results of a study tracking the onset and course of hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection in patients over a four- to six-year period.
"We looked at the natural history of the disease--namely what happens over time with respect to infection and clinical symptoms," says Miriam Alter, chief of the epidemiology section of the hepatitis branch at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in Atlanta. "We found that 62 percent of the patients developed chronic hepatitis and that all of them remained persistently infected even in the absence of liver disease or inflammation."
From an epidemiological perspective, this study proved significant, Alter explains, since "it showed that the majority of cases did not contract the disease from transfusions, which are believed to be the most common mode of spread. Most people get it [HCV] as a result of community-based exposure--sharing contaminated needles, for instance, or ...
