Hong YS, et al. - In this cohort study of 299,913 adults free of chronic kidney disease (CKD) at baseline who underwent health screening exams between January 2002 and December 2016 in South Korea, researchers assessed the prospective link between hepatitis B surface antigen (HBsAg) serology status and incident CKD among men and women by using fully adjusted models. The definition of incident CKD was the development of an estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR) < 60 ml/min/1.73m² and/or proteinuria. A follow-up of 1,673,701 person-years revealed association of HBsAg positive serology with higher risk of incident CKD. A higher incidence of proteinuria in HBsAg positive participants was proved to be responsible for this association. This study offers evidence suggesting a possible role of chronic hepatitis B virus infection as a contributor to the increasing incidence of CKD.