Week 23 – Hepatitis C In The News Today
Well, HepC is in the news today – in the newspapers, on telly and on the net (BBC News Online). 2000 patients are being asked to undertake blood tests because a doctor could have infected them with hepC.
I can’t help but note that this has received more coverage than recent NHS Hepatitis C Awareness campaign events. I know we are talking about 2000 people who suddenly discover they could unknowingly be at risk – and I am not dismissing the import of that. However, it isn’t only 2000 people that are at risk – the numbers are far higher than this. It has recently been stated that around 500,000 people in the UK have Hepatitis C and don’t know it.
So how come this information today has ‘caught’ and impacted in the media but other attempts to educate, even warn, people haven’t? As a society, do we only respond to ‘bad news’ or shock? Is this a reflection on our media and how it works?
A spokesman was quoted as saying that people could have hepatitis C without knowing it and modern treatment could prevent the onset of severe liver disease for many patients, he added. For many patients. Those soothing tones avoid the statistical information that modern treatment may leave up to half of those infected still with the virus after treatment. I guess the soothing tone demonstrates the concerns behind the scenes.
I wonder how much concern there is ‘behind the scenes’ generally about this ‘hidden epidemic’ and the impact it could have if more of the risks were actually more widely known. While we might have the ‘blood products’ issue made safe in recent years, how many dentists, hairdressers & barbers, tattooists, doctors, nurses might be unwittingly spreading the virus in exactly the same way as that doctor in the news today.
It makes me wonder – shouldn’t there be a HepC screening program for any professional who could be passing on the virus? Instead of screening (and alarming) 2000 people (this time) after the fact, wouldn’t it make better sense to screen 2000 professionals who could be infecting many more patients? Yes, there are more than 2000 professionals on the list I have cited above (and that’s not exhaustive) but I suspect this won’t be the last public scare. And the cost of any screening programme must surely be less than the costs of treating patients whose condition has advanced to more severe liver damage – not to mention the emotional cost to those people discovering that their advanced liver condition could have been prevented by an earlier intervention.
The spokesman in today’s news is from the Health Protection Agency. Can’t the HPA be pro-active, and not just reactive, in ‘protecting the public’? Can’t they contribute to the education and awareness needed in ‘protecting the public’?
Can’t the media be more pro-active, not just reactive, in bringing the hidden issue of Hepatitis C to public awareness?
April 20th, 2005 at 1:40 am
hi ron. while i agree with sue- being a health care worker with hcv too- i also have to say that the media in all its contemporary forms is about the “storification” of “news”. just about all modern reporting and recording of news stories has become exactly that: making up stories. there has to be the ingredients of a story. in your case over there the story has been cooked and pickled in such a way as to provide a negastive image. we must stop this slanting of news. maybe we must make the news? march? all the other guff that some of us used to do back then when the world was young?
burn our bras once again? i don’t know.
fitfully
tom
April 19th, 2005 at 7:46 pm
Hi Ron,
Maybe I am cynical but I think the answer to your question about awareness is a simple one, the NHS do not want their awareness campaign to succeed. Bottom line the treatment is expensive and if 500,000 people came forward there would be no way that the costs could be paid. I mean think about whoever it was that suggested launching an awareness campaign on the day of the budget should be shot for stupidity.
Maybe I am paranoid but this is a Governement that used the death of the Queen Mother as a means of burying bad news.
Jonathan
April 19th, 2005 at 3:45 pm
Hi Rone,
Yes you can buy brown rice from an Indian grocry shop. i am sure it would be cheaper than the health shop.
thank for sharing your feeling with me.
Ijaz
April 19th, 2005 at 11:40 pm
Hi Ron,
Not being over there, am at slight disadvantage as I don’t know the news. Just how did the physician potentially infect 2000 people? Seems like quite a task, considering it’s a blood-born disease.
The actual likelihood for a health care provider to spread a blood born disease through routine practice is small. The utilization of proper body substance precautions minimizes even further this potential and these universal precautions are supposed to be followed in all patient procedures. I suspect the possibility of transmission is much higher from professions not as clearly monitored and, as your number suggests, there are many of them. I’d also suspect that the transmission is more likely via contaminated equipment (i.e. patient-to-patient vectors, versus physician-to-patient) , again more frequently within nonmedical settings, than medical ones where standards are ostensibly specified, monitored and maintained.
Would disagree about forced public disclosure for hcv-infected professionals, in the same way that I don’t believe someone with hiv, or hep B, should be forced to public disclosure. This further stigmatizes a poplulation who, through no personal fault, are battling a chronic illness. Don’t really think it’s right to be tattooing hiv, hcv or any other illness on someone. That being said, I totally support the development, implementation and monitoring of the highest of protective standards within all professions, medical or otherwise, involving potential patient vectors for disease, including standards for the professionals themselves.
Just a different perspective, but then I’m a health care worker with hcv!
Sue
April 19th, 2005 at 6:41 pm
The days of campaigning journalism are long gone Ron. Now it is all knee jerk reaction. It makes good headlines for the Sun though,
“Hepc Tsunami set to hit Britain – thousands face chronic illness”. Actually that`s not bad, I`ll give them a ring now.
Paul.
April 19th, 2005 at 8:13 pm
this news should show how is this virus can be transmitted,easier then HIV never heard of that happening. If there is one doctor out there that is putting people at risk then there has to be other healthcare workers too. I gather that is not the case in UK Sun paper, it is an isolated situation. I concern why there is not an uprise in people who are infected, been on treatment, a few times, and it failed. Here in the US it is about 50% of getting the virus under control, down to undetected levels. The side-effects suck and then only to find out it did not work. I not real crazy about going on another round of treatment for the 5th time.
Dee C
Philly PA. USA