Humanosphere: Hepatitis is on the rise as a global killer
Kayla Albrecht, media relations officer at the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation, discusses results from a new analysis of viral hepatitis deaths published by The Lancet. Albrecht writes, “More people are dying from viral liver disease than ever before, scientists have found. … Overall, more deaths were caused by hepatitis in upper-, middle-, and high-income countries than in lower-, middle-, and low-income countries, using regions defined by the World Bank. Some hepatitis viruses afflict certain regions more than others, the study also discovered. … This finding underscores the notion that there is no one-size-fits-all prevention strategy for addressing viral hepatitis, especially when considering the different manners of transmission. … [P]revention and treatment strategies must be tailored to each country’s unique epidemic in order to truly impact hepatitis on a global scale” (7/28).