Enterovirus 71 (EV71) often causes large outbreaks of diseases among children worldwide and its pathogenesis remains unclear. The aim of the present study was to investigate the association between interferon-inducible protein 10 (IP-10) polymorphism in children with EV71 infection. Polymerase chain reaction (PCR) and restriction fragment length polymorphism (RFLP) were performed to analyze the gene polymorphisms of IP-10 (-1596C/T) in 58 EV71-infected and 48 control patients. The results showed that in EV71-infected patients the frequency of carrying CT + TT genotype and T allele is 10.3 and 6.0%, respectively, which is significantly lower than that of the controls (29.2 and 15.6%, respectively). Individuals with T allele had a lower risk of EV71 infection [odds ratio (OR) = 0.35, 95% confidence interval (CI), 0.13-0.89]. The results of this study indicated that -1596T allele for the IP-10 gene may be a beneficial factor for EV71 infection.
Keywords: Enterovirus 71; interferon-inducible protein 10; polymorphism; single nucleotide.