Abstract

Background: Herpes infections were caused predominantly by sexually transmission diseases. Especially the Herpes simplex viruses 1 and 2 appear in many parts of the body. Dermatologists were difficult to diagnose the infections, they can identify after performing blood and CSF tests. Prevalence of age and sex of herpes infections is important to optimize for herpes control strategies. Therefore the study was conducted to assess the epidemiological and molecular characteristics of Herpes Simplex Virus in the northern districts of south India, Tamil Nadu, Chennai.

Methodology: Samples from the northern districts of south India, TamilNadu, Chennai were accounted for the study. A total of 1244 serum and 163 CSF samples were examined for the prevalence of HSV from January 2013 to December 2013. Seroprevalence of the HSV was detected using the commercial IgM ELISA in study area. The positive samples were then subjected for Nested Polymerase Chain Reaction in CSF samples. The data were collected by and analyzed by statistical software using SPSS version 20.

Results: Neonates (0-1yr) showed higher positivity for HSV infection. The statistical analysis revealed that the Male gender were ranges from 0-12yrs were highly susceptible for the HSV infection and above 12yrs were poorly susceptible and month wise data showed higher prevalence was in november and december. The HSV nested PCR were performed and it was developed as marker for the molecular diagnosis for HSV infection. 282 bp of glycoprotein gene was amplified and it was characterized to detect the HSV in CSF samples.

Conclusion: Herpes simplex virus infection in the northern districts of South India reveals that the male populations have significant prevalence than the female gender. Further the neonates with 0-1yr age indicate higher positivity. This finally concludes that the transmission HSV from mother to fetus occurs significantly high.

Keywords: Herpes Simplex Virus; ELISA; PCR; Epidemiology and Molecular Characterization