"Global health" Hepatitis C kills 3,500 people every day

Geneva, April 9, 2017 – The World Health Organization revealed in a report issued today that hepatitis C viruses are still killing 3,500 people every day, a number that is rising, calling for quick action.

New data from 187 countries showed that the estimated number of deaths caused by viral hepatitis rose from 1.1 million in 2019 to 1.3 million in 2022, according to the report issued at the World Summit on Hepatitis. Meg Doherty, Director of the Department of HIV, Hepatitis and Sexually Transmitted Infections at the World Health Organization, considered these worrisome trends.

In total, 3,500 people die every day around the world as a result of hepatitis infection, 83 percent of them due to hepatitis B and 17 percent due to hepatitis C.

Updated WHO estimates indicate that 254 million people were infected with hepatitis B, and another 50 million were infected with hepatitis C in 2022.

Across all regions, only 3 percent of people with chronic hepatitis B infection had received antiviral treatment by the end of 2022. For hepatitis C, 20 percent had received treatment.

Meg Doherty stressed that these results are still a long way from the global goals of treating 80 percent of people infected with hepatitis C by 2030.

The Director-General of the World Health Organization, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, said in a statement that despite the progress made around the world in the field of prevention, the number of deaths is increasing, because very few people with hepatitis are diagnosed and treated.

-Except-