The Italian Cooperative Multiple Sclerosis case-control study: preliminary results on viral antibodies.

Viral antibodies to measles, HSV-1, HSV-2, EBV and HTLB-III have been tested in 120 sera and 90 CFS of 78 MS patients, 21 other neurological diseases and 21 non neurological disease controls included in the Italian Multicenter MS case-control study. A significantly higher frequency of HSV-2 antibodies was found in the MS cases than in the two control groups. Moreover the HSV-2 and the RBV-VCA cantibody levels were higher in the MS patients than in those with non neurological diseases. A clear or weak antibody response to the HTLV-III proteins was shown, using the Western Immunoblotting method, in 10.3% of the MS sera or CSF:8.6% of the sera and 1.8% of the CSF were positive. The significance of these findings in relation to the design of the multicenter case-control study is discussed.