Sci Rep. 2017 Jun 6;7(1):2912. doi: 10.1038/s41598-017-03080-6.
Estimating age-related incidence of HBsAg seroclearance in chronic hepatitis B virus infections of China by using a dynamic compartmental model.Zu J1,2, Zhuang G3, Liang P4, Cui F5, Wang F5, Zheng H5, Liang X6. Author information 1School of Mathematics and Statistics, Xi'an Jiaotong University, Xi'an, Shaanxi, 710049, P.R. China. [email protected].2Department of Ecology and Evolution, The University of Chicago, Chicago, IL, 60637, USA. [email protected].3School of Public Health, Xi'an Jiaotong University, Health Science Center, Xi'an, Shaanxi, 710061, P.R. China. [email protected].4Department of Medical Statistics, Ningxia People' Hospital, Yinchuan, Ningxia, 750002, P.R. China.5Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, Beijing, 100050, P.R. China.6Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, Beijing, 100050, P.R. China. [email protected].
AbstractThe age-specific seroclearance pattern of hepatitis B surface antigen (HBsAg) in chronic hepatitis B virus (HBV) infections of China remains unclear. In this study, based on three national serosurvey data of hepatitis B in China, we propose an age- and time-dependent discrete model and use the method of non-linear least squares to estimate the age-specific annual rate of HBsAg seroclearance. We found that the HBsAg seroclearance in chronic HBV infections of China aged 1-59 years occurred at an average annual rate of 1.80% (95% CI, 1.54-2.06%) from 1993 to 2006. The HBsAg seroclearance occurred predominantly in the early childhood, 20-24 and 35-39 year age groups. Moreover, our model estimated that HBsAg seroclearance resulted in 23.38% of the decrease of total HBsAg prevalence for population aged 1-59 years in 2006. It also prevented 9.30% of new HBV infections (about 7.43 million people) and 9.95% of HBV-related deaths (about 0.25 million people) from 1993 to 2006. This study develops a new and efficient method to estimate the age-specific incidence of HBsAg seroclearance at a population-level and evaluate its effect.