Variants of Hepatitis B Virus Associated with Fulminant Liver Disease

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Abstract
Two elegant articles in this issue of the Journal 1 , 2 describe a fulminant and fatal course of hepatitis in some patients infected with hepatitis B virus (HBV) in whose serum surface antigen (HBsAg) and antibodies to hepatitis B e antigen (anti-HBe) were present, rather than the hepatitis B e antigen (HBeAg) itself. HBeAg is a nonstructural protein of HBV discovered in the early 1970s.3 It is produced during active viral replication and secreted into the serum, but its function remains unknown. Recent studies have shown that the amino acid sequence of the HBeAg protein is largely identical to that of the . . .