World Hepatitis Day 2023
World Hepatitis Day is observed each year on 28 July to raise awareness of viral hepatitis, which causes inflammation of the liver that leads to severe disease and liver cancer. The slogan of this year’s campaign is “Hepatitis medicines are cheaper now. Treat to save lives”. Prices for diagnostics and treatment have been a main barrier for countries to scale up testing and treatment.
In WHO’s Eastern Mediterranean Region, countries have been making slow progress towards testing and treatment targets to eliminate hepatitis as a public health problem by 2030.
34%
of the 12 million persons living with hepatitis C infection had been started on treatment
2%
of the estimated 18 million living with hepatitis B were on treatment
Two opportunities for scaling up testing and treatment in the Eastern Mediterranean Region
- The COVID-19 pandemic led to considerable scaling up of the PCR diagnostic capacity that is key to testing and treatment of hepatitis.
- In May 2023, just before World Health Assembly, the Clinton Health Access Initiative (CHAI) and The Hepatitis Fund announced 2 new memoranda of understanding with leading generic manufacturers to lower the price of WHO-prequalified hepatitis B and C drugs in low- and middle-income countries. As a result, these countries are now able to obtain WHO-prequalified medicines with a 90% reduction in cost.
CHAI and The Hepatitis Fund announce pricing breakthrough to reduce cost of viral hepatitis treatment by over 90 percent
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Campaign materials
Regional Director's message
In 2016, the Sixty-ninth World Health Assembly endorsed a resolution to eliminate hepatitis as a public health problem by 2030. Unfortunately, our response to viral hepatitis has stagnated in recent years. In many countries, testing for hepatitis B and C virus infection with a view to treatment has not been scaled up because tests and medicines are regarded as too expensive. But this year, we have new opportunities.
Poster
Animated GIFs
Commentary
Related link
Access to treatment and care for all: the path to eliminate hepatitis C in Egypt