On the way towards the Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) for health, Europe has one important battle to take on: reducing the proportion of those living with undiagnosed HIV and viral hepatitis. Current status in the EU/EEA: one in seven people living with HIV are unaware of their infection, up to four out of 5 people living with hepatitis B and three out of four people with hepatitis C infection have not yet been diagnosed.
Targeted testing is an essential element of any strategy to eliminate viral hepatitis across the countries in the European Union and European Economic Area. Some preliminary monitoring results on the response to hepatitis B and C presented around World Hepatitis Day show that diagnosing chronic infections is still a challenge in the EU/EEA.
In order to maximise the benefits of treatment for HIV or viral hepatitis, it is critical to test and diagnose people as soon as possible in the course of the infection. ECDC supports this objective of European Testing Week.
The Carnival season will last from 1 to 9 March 2019. In Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, 1 million participants are expected, including many travellers from Europe
On the occasion of World Hepatitis Day, ECDC launched online prevalence database for hepatitis B and C which included data mainly based on peer-reviewed cross sectional studies from 2006 onwards.
People in prison experience a higher burden of communicable diseases such as hepatitis B (HBV), hepatitis C (HCV) and HIV often linked to a history of injecting drug use.
In their joint public health Guidance published today, ECDC and the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction (EMCDDA), present the evidence on active case finding as a key measure to diagnose communicable diseases early.