POSSIBLE MECHANISM INVOLVING T-LYMPHOCYTE RESPONSE TO NONSTRUCTURAL PROTEIN-3 IN VIRAL CLEARANCE IN ACUTE HEPATITIS-C VIRUS-INFECTION

In acute hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection only 20-50% of patients spo ntaneously clear the virus. To characterise the immune reaction during that phase we studied the response of peripheral blood mononuclear ce lls (PBMC) to the recombinant HCV proteins core, non-structural protei n 3 (NS3), NS4, and NS5 in 14 patients with acute hepatitis C. All eig ht patients with self-limited disease compared with two of six with ev olving chronic infection showed an NS3- specific PBMC response (p=0.01 5). Of 65 patients with established chronic hepatitis C, five showed a PBMC response to NS3. NS3-specific CD4 T-cell clones from patients wi th self-limited infection predominantly produced interferon-gamma and may thus support cytotoxic effector mechanisms important for viral cle arance.