1. The Discovery of HHV-8 Kaposis sarcoma was one of the original clinical syndromes that led to the discovery of HIV Thought for many years that the cause was infectious The virus was discovered in 1994 by Yuan Chang and colleagues at Columbia University Belongs to a family of viruses which cause cancer known as the gammaherpesvirus family

4. How is HHV-8 Transmitted ? Sexual Transmission HHV-8 infection has been linked to a history of various Sexually Transmitted Diseases No specific sexual behavior that results in infection has been identified Mother to Child In Africa, infections are rare before age two, but the number of infections in puberty is identical to adult prevalence. This suggests that children may get HHV-8 from their family Transmission through Blood Transmission through Saliva

14. High seroprevalence of antibodies to HHV-8 in Egyptian children: evidence of non-sexual transmission EBVCMV HHV-6 Years HHV-8 Years Andreoni. J nat cancer Inst. 1999

15. The clinical disease that is classically associated with HHV-8 infection is KS and less commonly Castlemans disease and primary effusion lymphoma (PEL). These HHV-8-associated diseases occur most commonly among immunocompromised patients, such as HIV-infected patients, those with end- stage renal disease, and transplant recipients. In the United States, the incidence of transplant associated KS is 10 to 20 times higher than the general population

22. The natural history of human herpesvirus 8 infection: clinical stages and determinants of progression.

23. Progression to KS stratified by HHV8 antibody titers Risk of Kaposis Sarcoma Adjusted RH 51.8 Adjusted RH 24.8 Rezza G, Journal of National Cancer Institute, 1999

24. Manifestazioni cliniche dellinfezione primaria di HHV8 nellimmunocompromesso Febbre, artralgia, linfoadenopatia (iperplasia angiolinfoide), splenomegalia e citopenia. HIV+ (Oksehendler NEJM 1998) Febbre, splenomegalia, pancitopenia. 2 trapiantati rene HHV-8 negativi. (Luppi NEJM 2000) Multiorgan failure. Bambina di un mese con S. Di George (Sanchez-Velasco, JID 2001) Febbre, sudorazioni, linfoadenopatia, epatite (Marcelin AIDS, 2000) Diarrea, linfoadenopatia rash. 5 omosessuali HIV negativi (Wang, Blood 2001) Esantema maculopapulare e artrite. Donna con artrite reumatoide (Herpesvirus infections, Parigi 2001)