Analysis of HCV-6 isolates among Asian-born immigrants in North America reveals their high genetic diversity and a new subtype

We characterized full-length genomes for 15 HCV-6 isolates, all from Asian immigrants living in North America. Among these isolates, nine were novel variants showing >15% nucleotide differences from their nearest relatives, representing lineages distinct from known subtypes. The other six were classified into subtypes 6c, 6h, 6q, 6r, and 6s. The partial sequences were also determined for five additional HCV-6 isolates, three from the US and two from Canada. The latter two were assigned to new subtype 6xf as they were found to classify with two other isolates for which we recently reported their full-length genomes. We further analyzed partial Core-E1 sequences of 100 HCV-6 isolates sampled in North America, seven from the US and 93 from Canada and all from Asian immigrants except for four from Caucasians. These 100 isolates belonged to 20 assigned subtypes and 16 unclassified lineages showing great genetic diversity and enhanced significance to public health.