Mohamed Abdel-Hamid
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Sameera Ezzat
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Sherif El-Kafrawy
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Sohair Abdel-Latif
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Mai El-Daly
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Paul Turner
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Anders Widell
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G. Thomas Strickland
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Alaa Ismail
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Christopher Loffredo
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ABSTRACT
A case-control study was conducted to study viral, genetics and environmental risk factors associated with hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) in Egypt, which has a high prevalence of hepatitis C virus (HCV) and hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection. From 1999 to 2004, 351 confirmed cases of HCC and 529 non-cancer controls matched by age, sex, and region of current residence were enrolled to the study. We have tested for HCV and HBV viral markers, exposure to pesticides, the level of aflatoxin (AFB1), and tobacco smoking and alcohol consumption as risk factors for the development of HCC. We also tested for genetic susceptibility markers and p53 mutations. The host genes tested were GSTM1, GSTT1 and COMT. The results indicate that current HCV infection (HCV RNA positive) was strongly associated with HCC risk (odds ratio [OR]=10.1, 95% confidence interval [CI]: 6.5-15.6) as was current HBV infection (HBsAg positive) (OR=2.8, 95% CI: 1.2-6.5). However, use of pesticides (OR=2.3, 95%CI: 1.3-3.9) was also significantly associated with HCC, including specific classes of pesticides. p53 mutations were found in 41.5% (17/41) of the tested tumor specimens. Exon 7 proved to be a hot spot for p53 mutation in HCC cases (84.1% ; 13/17). Of the 13 mutations in exon 7, ten (77%) were observed in codon 249 which was reported in literature to be associated with AFB1 exposure although AFB1 could not be detected among our cases. HCV genotyping suggested that HCC cases occurred throughout all genotype 4 subtypes, but with more HCC cases than controls observed in two clades determined by midcore sequencing and confirmed by 5’-UTR and NS5b sequencing. Tobacco smoking and alcohol consumption were not associated with increased cancer risk. None of the gene tested showed any correlation with the development of HCC.These results suggest that the occurrence of HCC in Egypt is predominantly a result of chronic viral infection, pesticide exposure and certain HCV clades.
Citation
How to cite this article
Mohamed Abdel-Hamid, Sameera Ezzat, Sherif El-Kafrawy, Sohair Abdel-Latif, Mai El-Daly, Paul Turner, Anders Widell, G. Thomas Strickland, Alaa Ismail and Christopher Loffredo, 2005. Viral, Genetics And Environmental Risk Factors For Hepatocellular Carcinoma In Egypt. International Journal of Virology, 1: 57-57.
DOI: 10.3923/ijv.2005.57.57
URL: https://scialert.net/abstract/?doi=ijv.2005.57.57
DOI: 10.3923/ijv.2005.57.57
URL: https://scialert.net/abstract/?doi=ijv.2005.57.57