不同丙肝患者接受相同治療，效果卻大不一樣，有些患者甚至會出現嚴重不良反應。美國一項新研究發現，這與人體中某個基因的微小變化密切相關。
美國杜克大學的戴維·戈爾茨坦等人8月16日在《自然》雜誌網絡版上發表論文說，人體DNA（脫氧核糖核酸）分子中有一個與防感染基因IL28B相連的基因，當這一基因的鹼基T被鹼基C替換時，人們接受丙肝療法的效果便會發生顯著變化。
戈爾茨坦等人研究了1600多名丙肝患者後發現，鹼基T被鹼基C替換後，這個基因便變成了“好基因”，因爲出現這種變化的丙肝患者比沒有變化的患者的治療效果要好得多。具有“好基因”的丙肝患者80%都被治癒，而沒有“好基因”的丙肝患者只有30%被治癒。
戈爾茨坦在一份聲明中說，這是一項很有價值的發現，它可以解釋爲什麼有些丙肝患者的治療效果很好，有些人卻治療無效。將來丙肝患者可根據他們的基因來選擇適當的治療方法。
據統計，全球有1.7億人感染丙肝，目前治療這種疾病最有效的藥物是干擾素加上利巴韋林，但不同人之間效果大不相同，科學家此前一直不知道原因所在。（Bioon.com）
生物谷推薦原始出處：
Nature advance online publication 16 August 2009 | doi:10.1038/nature08309
Genetic variation in IL28B predicts hepatitis C treatment-induced viral clearance
Dongliang Ge1, Jacques Fellay1, Alexander J. Thompson2, Jason S. Simon3, Kevin V. Shianna1, Thomas J. Urban1, Erin L. Heinzen1, Ping Qiu3, Arthur H. Bertelsen3, Andrew J. Muir2, Mark Sulkowski4, John G. McHutchison2 & David B. Goldstein1
1 Institute for Genome Sciences & Policy, Center
for Human Genome Variation, Duke University, Durham, North Carolina
27708, USA
2 Duke Clinical Research Institute and Division of
Gastroenterology, School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham,
North Carolina 27705, USA
3 Schering-Plough Research Institute, Kenilworth, New Jersey 07033,
USA
4 Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, Maryland
21205, USA
Chronic infection with hepatitis C virus (HCV) affects 170 million people worldwide and is the leading cause of cirrhosis in North America1. Although the recommended treatment for chronic infection involves a 48-week course of peginterferon-α-2b (PegIFN-α-2b) or -α-2a (PegIFN-α-2a) combined with ribavirin (RBV), it is well known that many patients will not be cured by treatment, and that patients of European ancestry have a significantly higher probability of being cured than patients of African ancestry. In addition to limited efficacy, treatment is often poorly tolerated because of side effects that prevent some patients from completing therapy. For these reasons, identification of the determinants of response to treatment is a high priority. Here we report that a genetic polymorphism near the IL28B gene, encoding interferon-λ-3 (IFN-λ-3), is associated with an approximately twofold change in response to treatment, both among patients of European ancestry (P = 1.06 10-25) and African-Americans (P = 2.06 10-3). Because the genotype leading to better response is in substantially greater frequency in European than African populations, this genetic polymorphism also explains approximately half of the difference in response rates between African-Americans and patients of European ancestry.