Opinion Review
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World J Transplant. Jan 18, 2022; 12(1): 1-7
Published online Jan 18, 2022. doi: 10.5500/wjt.v12.i1.1
Human pegivirus infection after transplant: Is there an impact?
Anna Mrzljak, Bojana Simunov, Ivan Balen, Zeljka Jurekovic, Tatjana Vilibic-Cavlek
Anna Mrzljak, Department of Gastroenterology and Hepatology, University Hospital Center Zagreb, School of Medicine, University of Zagreb, Zagreb 10000, Croatia
Bojana Simunov, Zeljka Jurekovic, Department of Medicine, Merkur University Hospital, Zagreb 10000, Croatia
Ivan Balen, Department of Gastroenterology and Endocrinology, General Hospital “Dr. Josip Bencevic”, Slavonski Brod 35000, Croatia
Tatjana Vilibic-Cavlek, Department of Virology, Croatian Institute of Public Health, School of Medicine, University of Zagreb, Zagreb 10000, Croatia
Author contributions: Mrzljak A made contributions to the concept and design the manuscript; Mrzljak A, Simunov B, Balen I, and Vilibic-Cavlek T were involved in writing the manuscript; Jurekovic Z critically revised the manuscript; and all authors approved the final manuscript.
Supported by the Croatian Science Foundation, Emerging and Neglected Hepatotropic Viruses after Solid Organ and Hematopoietic Stem Cell Transplantation, No. IP-2020-02-7407.
Conflict-of-interest statement: The authors declare no conflict of interest for this article.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article that was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: https://creativecommons.org/Licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Corresponding author: Anna Mrzljak, FEBG, PhD, Associate Professor, Department of Gastroenterology and Hepatology, University Hospital Center Zagreb, School of Medicine, University of Zagreb, Kispaticeva ulica 12, Zagreb 10000, Croatia. anna.mrzljak@gmail.com
Received: January 31, 2021
Peer-review started: January 31, 2021
First decision: October 17, 2021
Revised: October 25, 2021
Accepted: January 6, 2022
Article in press: January 6, 2022
Published online: January 18, 2022
Processing time: 345 Days and 9 Hours
Abstract

The microbiome's role in transplantation has received growing interest, but the role of virome remains understudied. Pegiviruses are single-stranded positive-sense RNA viruses, historically associated with liver disease, but their path-ogenicity is controversial. In the transplantation setting, pegivirus infection does not seem to have a negative impact on the outcomes of solid-organ and hematopoietic stem cell transplant recipients. However, the role of pegiviruses as proxies in immunosuppression monitoring brings novelty to the field of virome research in immunocompromised individuals. The possible immunomodulatory effect of pegivirus infections remains to be elucidated in further trials.

Keywords: Virome; Human pegivirus; Epidemiology; Solid-organ transplant; Hematopoietic stem cell transplantation

Core Tip: Pegiviruses are single-stranded positive-sense RNA viruses, historically associated with liver disease, but their pathogenicity is controversial. Pegivirus infection does not seem to have a negative impact on the outcome of solid-organ and hematopoietic stem cell transplant recipients. However, the role of pegiviruses as proxies in immunosuppression monitoring brings novelty to the field of virome research in immunocompromised individuals.