Doctors warn of death toll from 'silent epidemic' of hepatitis C

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BMJ

UK health news

(daily summaries of health stories appearing in UK national newspapers,

prepared for bmj.com by Presswatch Media, an international media monitoring

service)

Friday, 2 January 2004

Doctors warn of death toll from 'silent epidemic' of hepatitis C

Source: The Independent

Date: 01/01/2004

Report: Hospital specialists criticised the government yesterday for failing

to act to curb the spread of hepatitis C, a lethal blood-borne virus. The

disease is said to have infected 200,000 people in the UK - four times as

many people as HIV. Only a quarter of victims know they are infected and

just one per cent are receiving treatment. The DoH published a strategy for

dealing with the epidemic 18 months ago but nothing has been done despite

the promise of an action plan.