More than 80% of Patients Treated with Plasma Products Before 1987 Developed Chronic HCV Infections

 

• Nearly all patients treated with plasma products for hemophilia in this era were exposed to HCV.
• The incidence of infection peaked in the late 1960s and the early 1970s, potentially due to cryoprecipitate and factor concentrates that were pooled from large numbers of donors.
• After the discovery of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), improved donor screening practices and the introduction of heat inactivation resulted in a sharp decline in HCV incidence after 1984.