Chromosome aberrations in leukocytes of filaria-infected indigenous inhabitants in the Philippines.

In the course of genetic population surveys of a tribal group of the Philippine Negritos living on Mindanao island, microfilariae (Wuchereria bancrofti) were incidentally found on the microscopic slides for a cytogenetic investigation. Structural chromosome aberrations in the cultured leukocytes from 19 filaria-infected and 22 uninfected subjects were studied. The frequencies of chromosome type aberrations such as dicentrics and chromosome breaks in the infected subjects were significantly higher than those in the uninfected subjects (P less than 0.05). The frequencies of chromatid type aberrations, however, were not significantly different between the filaria-infected subjects and the uninfected subjects.