[The epidemiological diagnosis of "fecal-oral" hepatitis E in Tajikistan]

On the basis of the results of the retrospective epidemiological analysis of hepatitis A morbidity for many years in the Leninabad (now Hojend) region of Tajikistan the possibility of the epidemiological diagnosis of fecal-oral hepatitis non A, non B, also known as hepatitis E, was confirmed. Analysis of the specific features of a sharp morbidity rise in hepatitis A in this region in 1986-1987 made it possible to establish that this rise was caused by hepatitis E. This was testified by the explosive character of morbidity; the prevalence of persons aged 15-29 years, found to have antibodies to hepatitis A virus in 95% of cases (among patients, these persons constituted 67.5% of the total number of hepatitis A patients and children of preschool age constituted only 8.8% of such patients); sharply pronounced irregularity in the distribution of morbidity in individual settlements, depending on the state of water supply; a low number of the foci of infection in patient's families; the unfavorable course of the disease in pregnant women with high mortality rate (19%) among them. Similar epidemiological features were noted in hepatitis E outbreaks, occurring at the same period in the adjoining regions in Kirghizia and Uzbekistan, where the etiology of the disease was established by excluding the markers of hepatitides A and B in most of the patients. Some data indicate that the causes of these outbreaks of hepatitis E were linked with the water route of the transmission of hepatitis E virus.