Chronic hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection affects around 3.5 million children worldwide, and in Australia, it’s estimated that it affects at least 4 children per million under 15 years old. Children with chronic hepatitis C infection can suffer from reduced quality of life, social stigmatisation, and inadequate access to specialist care. As with adults, the disease can progress to hepatic fibrosis, chronic liver disease, and hepatocellular cancer.
Tag: hepatitis C treatment
More Evidence of DAAs’ Power for Elimination
A recent large-scale study confirms that treating chronic hepatitis C patients with direct-acting antivirals (DAA) leads to improved outcomes and better long-term survival.
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Bringing Testing to Community
Moorundi Aboriginal Controlled Health Service will soon be offering hepatitis C point of care testing (POCT) to the community, along with its new Clean Needle Program (CNP) at the service’s Murray Bridge site. The initiative is part of a push to bring hepatitis rapid testing to regional South Australia, under the umbrella of the world-first National Australia HCV Point of Care Testing Program (HCVPOCT).
Hep C Elimination Falling Behind
A Story of Mixed Success
The newly released 2022 annual report from the Burnet and Kirby institutes, Australia’s Progress Towards Hepatitis C Elimination, has a story of mixed success to tell.
Unrestricted access to direct-acting antivirals (DAAs) through public subsidy since March 2016 means there is a real opportunity to reach the official government target of eliminating hepatitis C as a public health threat in Australia by 2030.
Jake’s Story: Haemophilia & the Hepatitis C Cure
For Jake (name changed for privacy reasons), managing hepatitis C and taking care of his liver health has been a long journey, but every step has been worthwhile. Jake has mild haemophilia. He first found out he had hepatitis C as a young boy in the 1980s when the children’s hospital called him in for testing. At the time he was more worried that he might have HIV, as that was a big concern for people with haemophilia. This is his story as told to Haemophilia Foundation Australia.
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Haemophilia & Childhood Hep C
For most people who live with haemophilia and were exposed to hepatitis C through their treatment products, before proper testing was introduced, the diagnosis experience was more than 30 years ago. If they were diagnosed as a child, it might have been their parents who received the test results and they might not have been certain whether they still had hepatitis C until they were older.