Seroprevalence of human T-Lymphotropic virus type I (HTLV-I) in Costa Rica

Abstract

Infection within the human T linphotropic virus type I (HTLV-I), a virus associated with two diseases, adult T-cell leukemia lyriphornal and tropical spastic paraparesis/HTLV-I associated myelopathy,2 is prevalent in Panama' and Colombia. To determine if HTLV-I is present in neighboring Costa Rica, we tested 436 sera from women who participated, between 1984 and 198.5, in a case-control study of cervical cancer in Costa Rica. These sera were all that were still available to us from the 765 collected from control participants in the study. Study participants had all been interviewed and tested for several serologic markers of sexually transmitted diseases (STDs).