[Epidemic of viral hepatitis in a mountain community of western Sicily].

Epidemiological investigations were carried out during and after a viral hepatitis A outbreak in a mountain town, Geraci Siculo, in western Sicily. Blood samples were obtained through finger prick or by venipuncture from patients, their family contacts and from healthy school children of different age groups (3 to 15 year old). Serum markers for hepatitis A (anti HAV and IgM anti HAV) and hepatitis B (HBsAg and anti HBs) were tested. All but two of 36 cases, which occurred from August through March with a peak in November and December were under 15; 33 of them, in which laboratory data were available, were due to HAV. Seroepidemiological investigations, performed in December 1979 and in May 1980, have shown a low prevalence of anti HAV antibodies: 11.5% only of the children tested were positive in the first sampling and 22% in the second one. Also prevalence of HBV markers was low, as compared with similar observations carried out previously in other different area of Western Sicily.