Ethnic Disparities in Hepatitis B Virus Infection Among 1 Million Reproductive-Age Couples Preparing for Pregnancy in the Rural Yunnan, China: A Population-Based Cross-Sectional Study

Frontiers in Medicine

Medicine

Min Liu¹  Jue Liu¹  Wenzhan Jing¹  Yu Wu¹  Cai Kong²  Hanfeng Ye²  Yanling Yuan² 

[1] Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, School of Public Health, Peking University, Beijing, China;Reproductive Epidemiology Laboratory, Yunnan Population and Family Planning Research Institute, Kunming, China;

关键词: hepatitis B virus;    ethnic;    disparity;    reproductive-age;    China;   

DOI  :  10.3389/fmed.2021.799873

 received in 2021-10-22, accepted in 2021-12-20,  发布年份 2022

来源: Frontiers

【 摘 要 】

IntroductionHepatitis B is a potentially life-threatening liver infection caused by hepatitis B virus (HBV) and China has the largest disease burden. We aim to understand the ethnic disparities in HBV infection among the married reproductive-age couples planning for pregnancy in Yunnan, a multiethnic province in Southwest China, to increase the health equities within the hepatitis response in China.MethodsA population-based cross-sectional study was performed. Couples aged 20–49 years in rural Yunnan were enrolled through the National Free Preconception Health Examination Project from Jan 2014 to Dec 2019. HBsAg-positive couples were defined as couples in which one or both were HBsAg-positive, and HBsAg- and HBeAg-positive couples were defined as couples in which one or both were HBsAg- and HBeAg-positive. The HBV prevalence of positive couples was estimated by ethnicity. Multivariate logistic regression analyses were used to assess the association between ethnicity and HBsAg status.ResultsOverall, 63,513 of 1,060,643 couples (5.99%, 95% CI, 5.94%−6.03%) were HBsAg-positive, and 15,898 of 63,513 HBsAg-positive couples (25.03%, 95% CI 24.69%−25.37%) were HBsAg- and HBeAg-positive couples in rural Yunnan. The highest prevalence of HBsAg-positive couples was in the Miao and Miao ethnicity (12.04%) and Zhuang and Zhuang ethnicity (9.76%), and the risk of HBV infection of wives/husbands in these ethnic groups was significantly higher than that in the Han and Han ethnicity. Additionally, the HBsAg prevalence in wives/husbands has increased with the positive status of HBsAg and HBeAg of their spouses.ConclusionThe HBV prevalence in reproductive-age couples was intermediate (6% of 1 million couples) in rural Yunnan, China, with the highest in the Miao and Zhuang ethnicities. There are still large ethnic disparities in HBV infection in China. Therefore, China should make great efforts, especially giving priority to ethnic minorities and taking positive couples as an important unit of care, to equitably eliminate the HBV intrafamilial transmission.

【 授权许可】

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Copyright © 2022 Jing, Yuan, Liu, Ye, Kong, Liu and Wu.