High Rate of HBV and HIV Infections among Pregnant Women in a Semi-Urban Community of Oyo State, Nigeria

Abstract

To determine the prevalence of HIV and HBV co-infection among pregnant women and to identify factors that may enhance transmission of both infections in a semi-urban community in Nigeria, a cross sectional study was carried out in four hospitals in Saki, a semi-urban community in Oyo State, Nigeria from March to April 2013. Blood samples were collected from 236 consenting pregnant women attending the various hospitals for antenatal care. Presence of HBV and HIV infections was detected using commercially available ELISA kits. Structured questionnaire was used to capture demographic and risk related information from participants. Data were analyzed using Chi square and Fishers exact test at p = 0.05. Out of the 236 participants, 16 (6.8%) and 28 (11.9%) were positive for HIV and HBV respectively. Two (0.85%) of the individuals tested positive for both viruses, with higher rate of coinfection among HIV positive 12.5% (2/16) than HBV positive 7.1% (2/28) pregnant women. The highest prevalence of HBV (18.2%) was found in women < 20 years while the highest HIV prevalence (33.3%) was in women between 40 – 49 years old. Rate of HBV was higher among those with history of blood transfusion. The rate of HIV infection among pregnant women in this study is higher than the rate earlier reported in the national sentinel survey. The high rate of HBV infection found reinforces the need to vaccinate women of child bearing age in sub-Saharan Africa against the infection in order to prevent mother to child transmission.