Hepatitis B Virus （HBV）： The Number One Natural Enemy In The History Of Human Infectious Diseases

The discovery of

the Hepatitis B virus

Though there was no saying of “hepatitis virus” in ancient China， according to the records of the ancient literatures， the virus hepatitis may be an ancient disease. For early in the Han dynasty， the famous doctor Zhang Zhongjing had catalogued the jaundices in his work “Treatise on Febrile and Miscellaneous Disease”， some of them might be caused by hepatitis B.

The first time for the western medical community knew about this disease might be the year 1883. It is said an accidental event caused the spread of smallpox， to prevent smallpox， a dockyard in Germany inoculated the vaccine for cowpox to its workers. Then some of the workers got the jaundice， which might be acute jaundice hepatitis B infected by blood.

Until 1965， the foreign scholar Michael Bloomberg found an unusual antibody in the serum of two patients who had the blood transfusion therapy for many times. The antibody could react with the antigen in serum and form precipitation， the character of the antigen was not clear. As it was from the aboriginal people of Australia， Bloomberg named it “Australian antigen”.

The DNA virus

specializing in human

The HBV is mainly composed of two parts. The outside is a coat shell covering the virus， as the thin film structure of common virus. This coat shell is composed of lipid bilayer and protein， with hepatitis B surface antigen and protein adhering to it. The core of the inner is double-stranded DNA， with DNA polymerase on it. The DNA is composed of about 3200 nucleotides. It is worth mentioning that the two DNA strands are not in the same length， and that is why its difficult to cope with.

Its difficult to find out by the microscope that there are three forms of the HBV， they are large spherical particle， small spherical particle and tubular particle. The large particle is the most famous Dana particle， while the small particle is most common particle in the blood after infected by HBV， there is no DNA and relevant polymerase in the small particle. The tubular particle are actually formed by several small particles， it also has the antigenicity.

The aboriginal people

in Peru are endangered，

the reason might be HBV.

Though HBV is so widely disseminated， in some backward regions， people still pay little attention to it. An aboriginal tribe in the amazon rainforest of Northern Peru is near extinction for large-scale hepatitis B virus infection. The HBV has been transmitted into the tribe as a foreign virus for more than 10 years， but the local government never tried to control it， which causing the death number for this disease increased rapidly.

There are about 2400 people in the tribe called Kandos， 169 of them are patients of HBV， and 80 people have die for the disease. As the lack of the governments attention， the spread of HBV in this tribe was uncontrolled ， so the infection and morbidity is very severe. Several other tribes in that province are facing the same problems.

The HBV suddenly broke out in nearly a decade， a local nurse called Karna doubted it was brought in by foreigners. “Since the 1990s， after the occidental petroleum corporation got the petroleum mining right of this jungle， the HBV began to break out in the region，” Karna recalled. Of course， the situation is related to the local medical treatment level. There exists the phenomenon of unsafe injections， infection by degassing and drawing blood， and bad habits as taking drugs or tattoo， which all caused the large scale of spread of HBV.

Humans war to prevent

and cure the HBV

Now that we have found the real body of the HBV， how to kill and prevent from the virus becomes the key point of peoples research. Fortunately， HBV is sensitive to many common methods of disinfecion， for example， the 2 minutes thermal disinfection will kill the HBV. And the inactivations aiming at the HBV by peracetic acid， ethylene oxide， lodine preparation and glutaraldehyde all have good effects.

Though HBV is so widely disseminated， in some backward regions， people still pay little attention to it. An aboriginal tribe in the amazon rainforest of Northern Peru is near extinction for large-scale hepatitis B virus infection. The HBV has been transmitte.

Edited by Jia Hongtao

Science Adviser： Wu Haiyun