A new report from the UK Health Security Agency has highlighted the progress that has been made to cut cases of hepatitis C in England, with a reduction of almost 57% since 2015.
The report identifies the positive steps that England is making towards meeting the World Health Organisation’s 2030 deadline to eliminate hepatitis by 2030, but the British Liver Trust has warned that unless similar steps are replicated to address hepatitis B, the 2030 target will be missed.
The Hepatitis C in England 2024 report shows:
- around 55,900 adults aged 16 years and over were estimated to be living with chronic hepatitis C in 2023, a decrease of 56.7% since 2015.
- 3% of individuals diagnosed with chronic hepatitis C between 2015 and 2023 began treatment, with this proportion indicating that England has nearly achieved the WHO target for treatment coverage of 80% or more. Among individuals who were diagnosed and linked to care, 96.1% initiated treatment.
- Increased access to treatment has also led to a low hepatitis C virus-related mortality rate of 0.41 per 100,000 population.
- The prevalence of chronic hepatitis C in people who inject drugs has continued to decrease since 2017 and was2% in 2023.
Although the British Liver Trust welcomes this very positive latest set of results, we are concerned that unless hepatitis B receives similar focus and attention, the 2030 deadline to eliminate hepatitis will not be met.
Chronic hepatitis B is a preventable and treatable disease and there are safe and effective vaccines. Although there currently is no cure, once-a-day tablets are a safe and highly effective way to prevent death from both liver disease and liver cancer. Yet with the UK Health Security Agency previously estimating that fewer than 50% of people living with hepatitis B in England have been diagnosed, it is clear that we still have a long way to go before we can even come close to eliminating hepatitis by the WHO’s 2030 deadline.
Last December, we launched a report, Hepatitis B – Breaking the Silence that identified our concerns, whilst presenting some very straight forward solutions that must be implemented if we are to achieve elimination of hepatitis B by 2030 both at home in the UK, and internationally.
The solutions include the appointment of a national clinical lead, similar to the hepatitis C elimination programme – which has clearly had a very positive impact – to ensure a strategic focus on eliminating hepatitis B. We also want to see opt-out testing for blood borne viruses (BBV), including hepatitis B across all Emergency Departments in the UK because, as recent research has shown, there are far more cases of undiagnosed hepatitis B than previously thought.
We also recognise the importance of community healthcare settings, and together with an all-encompassing public awareness campaign, and supported by peer support workers and community outreach programmes, we want to ensure that those who are most at risk are accessing vaccinations, testing, treatment, and that anyone with hepatitis B is monitored and can continue on a supported and effective pathway of care.
