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Sera of 155 chronic hepatitis (CH) patients in Argentina were tested for the presence of HBsAg, anti-HBs, anti-HBc, and anti-HAV. Our purpose was to define the role that both virus A and B might play in the etiology and pathogenesis of this condition. The patients were divided into two groups: group I (57) HBsAg-negative; group II (98) HBsAg-positive. The control group consisted of 1,209 healthy blood donors from Banco Central de Sangre de Rosario; 286/1,209 (24%) had viral markers for HBV. In group I, 38/57 (67%) had anti-HBs and/or anti-HBc, but none had anti-HBs alone. Group II showed a higher percentage of males (P less than 0.05). We found similar incidence of anti-HAV among group I, group II, and the control group.

Over a seven-year period, we monitored 221 patients with chronic hepatitis from two medical centers. By using the counterlectrophoresis (CEP) test to detect the presence of HBsAg and anti-HBc, or both, we established that 87.7% of them had hepatitis B infection. Serum specimens originally found negative for HBsAg by CEP were further tested by reversed passive hemagglutination (RPH), and those originally found negative for anti-HBc by CEP were further tested by radioimmunoassay (RIA). Five patients were anti-HBc-positive and HBs-Ag-negative. No sex predominance was observed, but HBsAg incidence increased with increasing age. The HBeAg antigen was detected in 46.8% of the 161 cases tested for it; the most frequent subtype found was adw (63.7%). The present findings indicate that HBV infection largely contributes to the development of chronic hepatitis in Argentinian patients.