Diabetes Mellitus Type 1, Latent Autoimmune Diabetes of Adults and Hepatitis C Virus: What we Know and what we Need to Know

Hepatitis C virus infection and diabetes mellitus are two major public health problems worldwide and the burden of these diseases is expected to increase in the near future. Hepatitis C virus is associated to autoimmune disorders of several organs (e.g. thyroid and kidney) and has recently been reported to be associated also to metabolic disorders including type 2 diabetes mellitus. Biologically, the homologies between the hepatitis C virus polyprotein and the pancreas antigens could underlie a mechanism of molecular mimicry that could lead to autoimmune diabetes (type 1 diabetes mellitus and latent autoimmune diabetes of adults). Here we review the data on the potential relationship between HCV-related chronic liver disease and autoimmune mediated diabetes mellitus.