Time trends of HBeAg prevalence rate

In order to examine the time trends of HBeAg prevalence rate among HBV carriers in Japan, we analyzed the data on HBeAg and HBeAb of HBsAg positive volunteer blood donors (23, 560 males, and 8, 659 females) at the Osaka Red Cross Blood Center between Jan. 1977 and Mar. 1984. Age-specific prevalence rates of HBeAg among them seemed to decrease year by year for both sexes, especially in the teen-agers and the twenties. The prevalence rates of HBeAg continued to decrease with age, but at any given age those rates were lower for the later than for the earlier birth-cohorts. These findings suggest that HBeAg prevalence rate among HBV carriers Will continue to decrease in Japan.