Diagnostic Value of Anti-GBV-C Antibodies in HIV-Infected Patients

The beneficial effect of co‐infection by GB virus C (GBV‐C) in the course of the disease in human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)‐infected patients has been described, although its mechanism of action is yet to be determined. The role of anti‐GBV‐C antibodies in HIV‐infected patients also remains unknown. At present, there are no commercial systems to detect specific markers of GBV‐C infection. The research presented follows our previous work from which we obtained chimeric molecules formed by two domains of different GBV‐C proteins with good sensitivity/specificity balances in the detection of anti‐GBV‐C antibodies in hemodialyzed and chronic hepatitis patient samples. It has been investigated the ability of the synthetic peptides to recognize specific anti‐GBV‐C antibodies in HIV and HCV/HIV co‐infected patients by a peptide‐based ELISA immunoassay. The results showed that human immunodeficiency virus‐infected patients have a significantly higher frequency of anti‐GBV‐C antibodies than healthy controls. A comparison between HCV+/HIV+ and HCV−/HIV+ was analyzed. Although a higher percentage of HCV/HIV‐positive sera were positive for antibodies against GBV‐C peptides, the difference was not significant. The presence of anti‐GBV‐C antibodies could represent a good marker of exposure to GBV‐C in HIV‐infected patients to facilitate a further analysis of the effect of this exposure in the progression of illness caused by HIV infection. The presence of antibodies against chimeric peptides formed by two domains of different GBV‐C proteins could represent a good marker of exposure to GBV‐C in HIV patients.