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Calvin E. Oyer, MD; Teresita Redondo, MD
St Barnabas Medical Center, Livingston, NJ

JAMA. 1986;256(23):3217.

	Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text PDF and any section headings.

To the Editor.—

The report of an outbreak of hepatitis B (HB) transmitted by a dentist¹ was of much interest and was informative in emphasizing one of the methods of spread of a serious illness. In the last paragraph of the article, however, the authors concluded that this tragic outbreak "should reinforce recommendations to administer HB vaccine to dental professionals early in their careers" and implied that earlier vaccination of the dentist in question would have prevented this tragedy.

While the dentist was a carrier of HB virus (as indicated by his positivity to hepatitis B surface antigen [HBsAg] and hepatitis B e antigen persisting for at least one year), the conclusion that earlier vaccination would have prevented this state cannot be supported. It has been demonstrated² that administration of vaccine to HBsAg carriers does no harm but fails to eliminate the persistent positivity to HBsAg. Administration of . . . [Full Text PDF of this Article]

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