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Serial serum specimens (before infection through 200 days after infection) in 31 MS-1 (short incubation) and 19 MS-2 (long incubation) cases of viral hepatitis were examined for the presence of Australia/SH antigen. An agar-gel double-diffusion technic was used. The antigen was not detected in any serum from the MS-1 series, but it appeared regularly after MS-2 infection, usually well in advance of evidence of hepatitis. In approximately half the MS-2 infections the antigen was present only transiently (up to 68 days), but in the remainder, it persisted throughout the period of intensive observation and for at least three years subsequently.
Giles et al. (1969) studied this question.