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Transmission of Hepatitis B Virus by Sweating / Perspiration

You're especially at risk if you are an intravenous (IV) drug user who shares needles or other paraphernalia, have unprotected sexual contact with an infected partner, or were born in or travel to parts of the world where hepatitis B is widespread. In addition, women with HBV can pass the infection to their babies during childbirth.

Someone with hepatitis B may have symptoms similar to those caused by other viral infections, such as the flu — for example, tiredness, nausea, loss of appetite, mild fever, and vomiting — as well as abdominal pain or pain underneath the right ribcage where the liver is.The severe pathological consequences of persistent HBV infections include the development of chronic hepatic insufficiency, cirrhosis, and hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). In addition, HBV carriers can transmit the disease for many years.

Hepatitis B can also cause jaundice, which is a yellowing of the skin and the whites of the eyes, and may cause the urine to appear brownish.It may be mild, without symptoms, or it may cause chronic hepatitis. In some cases, hepatitis B can lead to full-blown liver failure and death. The following are the most common symptoms of hepatitis B. However, each individual may experience symptoms differently.

The hepatitis B virus is transmitted through contact with the blood and body fluids of someone who is infected — the same way the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), the virus that causes AIDS, spreads. Yet hepatitis B is nearly 100 times as infectious as HIV.It is estimated that approximately 140,000 to 320,000 infections occur each year, and an estimated 1.0 to 1.25 million people have chronic hepatitis B.

You get hepatitis B by direct contact with the blood or body fluids of an infected person. For example, you can get it from:

having unprotected sex with someone infected with hepatitis B
sharing needles for drug injection with an infected person
your mother if she had hepatitis B at the time she gave birth to you
getting a body part pierced or a permanent tattoo with nonsterile equipment.

HBV is a large virus and does not cross the placenta, hence it cannot infect the fetus unless there have been breaks in the maternal-fetal barrier, e.g. via amniocentesis. Still, pregnant women who are infected with HBV can transmit their disease to their babies at birth. If not vaccinated at birth, many of these babies develop lifelong HBV infections, and many develop liver failure or liver cancer later in life.The disease can be spread by people who do not have any symptoms and may not know they carry the virus. These people are called asymptomatic carriers.

Recently findings from a study of Olympic wrestlers indicate that hepatitis B virus is found in the sweat of infected individuals, and so sweating might be a way that the virus could be passed between participants in contact sports.

Bleeding wounds and mucous membranes have been implicated in hepatitis B transmission during contact sports, but until now no study had looked to see if sweat carries the virus.

Dr. S. Bereket-Yucel, from Celal Bayar University in Izmir, Turkey, tested for DNA of the hepatitis B virus in blood and sweat samples from 70 male Olympic wrestlers.

The results indicated that 9 (13 percent) of the wrestlers had the hepatitis B virus in their blood. However, these were deemed "occult" infections because no antibodies to the virus were detected in any of the wrestlers, according to the investigators' report released Thursday ahead of print by the British Journal of Sports Medicine.

In eight of the nine participants whose blood tested positive, DNA for hepatitis B was also detected in sweat.

Based on these results, "Evidence is emerging that the incidence of occult HBV in Olympic wrestling is higher than expected and that transmission of HBV may also occur through sweat," the researcher concludes.

"The advice of sports organizations about HBV testing should be changed," they recommend, "making it obligatory for all participants involved in contact sports and playing under adult rules to be vaccinated against hepatitis B."

Most people infected as adults recover fully from hepatitis B, even if their signs and symptoms are severe. Infants and children are much more likely to develop a chronic infection. Although no cure exists for hepatitis B, a vaccine can prevent the disease. If you're already infected, taking certain precautions can help prevent HBV from spreading to others.