HIV, HCV, HBV and syphilis infections among blood donors in Germany 2005. Report from the Robert Koch Institute in accordance with Article 22 of the Transfusion Act

Robert Koch Institute collects and evaluates data on the prevalence and incidence of HIV, hepatitis C (HCV), hepatitis B (HBV) and syphilis infections among blood and plasma donors in Germany according to article 22 of the Transfusion Act. The surveillance data permit an assessment of the occurrence of infections in the blood donor population and consequently the safety of the collected donations. This report includes data from all blood donation services in Germany for 2005. In total, 6.26 million donations or blood samples from prospective donors were screened. The prevalence of the relevant infections was 6.1/100,000 for HIV, 81.2/100,000 for HCV, 143.9/100,000 for HBV and 35.6/100,000 donations for syphilis. The rate of seroconversions/100,000 donations was 0.9 for HIV, 1.4 for HCV, 0.9 for HBV and 2.3 for syphilis. The analysis showed a very low incidence of infections with a decreasing trend for HCV infections among first time donors and an increase in incident HIV and syphilis infections since 1999. The latter has to be monitored carefully and possible causes need to be evaluated.