Background: To investigate the distribution of anti-TTV antibody and the different ORF gene in different populations of China.
Methods: The antibody to TTV in sera collected from different population were detected by using ELISA and the different ORF genes were amplified with PCR.
Results: The positive rates of TTV ORF1 DNA, ORF2 DNA and the antibody in various populations were as follows: 16.0% (12/75), 10.7% (8/75) and 25.3% (19/75) in paid blood donors; 10.0 (3/30), 16.7% (5/30) and 16.7% (5/30) in patients with hepatitis A, 47.5% (19/40), 42.5% (17/40) and 22.5% (9/40) in patients with hepatitis B; 42.9% (15/35), 37.1% (13/35) and 28.6% (10/35) in patients with hepatitis C; 20.0% (3/15), 26.7% (4/15) and 13.3% (2/15)in patients with hepatitis D; 16.7% (2/12),16.7% (2/12) and 33.3% (4/12)in patients with hepatitis E; 23.8% (5/21), 38.1% (8/21) and 23.8% (5/21) in patients with hepatitis G; 61.1% (11/18), 50.0% (9/18) and 44.4% (8/18) in patients with non A-G hepatitis, respectively. The positive rate of different ORF DNA had no significant difference. Significant differences were found in the positive rates of TTV DNA in various populations. There was no relationship between the TTV DNA and the antibody to TTV.
Conclusions: The antibody to TTV and TTV DNA were found in every population of China. There was no significant difference in the positive rates of TTV DNA between ORF1 and ORF2. The positive rate in patients with non A-G hepatitis was higher than those in the other populations.