QUANTIFICATION OF HEPATITIS-C VIRUS-RNA IN PERIPHERAL-BLOOD MONONUCLEAR-CELLS - A COMPARISON BETWEEN PATIENTS CHRONICALLY INFECTED BY HCV AND PATIENTS COINFECTED BY HIV

In patients chronically infected by hepatitis C virus (HCV), periphera l blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) were shown to be targets for virus r eplication and in those coinfected with HIV, HCV viraemia was consider ably increased. The purpose of this study was to quantify HCV RNA in P BMCs from 25 patients infected by HCV and from 25 patients coinfected by HCV and HIV. We used the branched DNA assay after extraction of tot al RNA on 5 x 10(6) cells to quantify HCV RNA, and the Inno LipA(TM) a ssay to determine the HCV genotype. HCV RNA in PBMCs could be quantifi ed in 8/25 patients in each group, but the HCV RNA concentration was v ery low in comparison with viraemia, since the highest result was 8.1 x 10(4) Eq genome/10(6) cells. In 10 ml of total blood, there was appr oximately 100 to 5,000 times less HCV RNA in PBMCs than in the plasma. It is therefore likely that PBMCs play only a minor part in the viral load present in the plasma. There was no preferential genotype associ ated with quantifiable HCV RNA in the PBMCs. In the case of HIV coinfe ction, there was no increase in the HCV-RNA concentration in PBMCs tha t could explain the increased viraemia observed in these patients. On the contrary, HCV RNA could not even be detected by RT-PCR in some of our coinfected patients.