Abstract from Fourth National Congress of Virology with International Participation /Days of Virology in Bulgaria Sofia, May 18th - 20th, 2016

Zhivka Stoykova, Liliya Iv. Ivanova

Department of Microbiology and Virology, Faculty of Medicine, Medical University, Varna, Bulgaria

Laboratory of Clinical Virology, St. Marina University Hospital, Varna, Bulgaria

The prevalence of cytomegalovirus (CMV) infections is between 50% and 85% in adults in different parts of the world. Its epidemiology varies between socioeconomic and age groups. Our retrospective study has been performed to determine the seroprevalence of CMV in the general population in Northeastern Bulgaria. Between 2003 – 2015, we estimated the prevalence of individuals with antibodies to CMV using indirect enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay to detect virus-specific IgG and IgM. The population sample included 7879 individuals of both sexes and different ages. The total seroprevalence of CMV was determined as 78.4%.

The relative deal of acute CMV infections was determined as 22.8%. We analysed the proportion of CMV IgG and IgM by sex and/or age group. The results of the study reveal that CMV infection is highly prevalent in the population and occurs mainly in the first years of life.