New study outlines case for greater hepatitis C treatment efforts

The government has published a study that lays out a case for increased investment in hepatitis C treatment across England.

Published in the Journal of Hepatology, the Public Health England research looked at the cost of increasing hepatitis C treatment uptake in England and the impact this would have on disease burden.

At present, around 160,000 individuals are chronically infected with the disease in England, but only 28,000 people received treatment between 2006 and 2011, equivalent to only three percent of the population group.

It was estimated that it would only take a 31 percent increase over the amount currently being spent to scale up standard treatment to 100 percent coverage, when factoring in the burden of associated healthcare costs presented by untreated hepatitis C.

Dr Helen Harris, a hepatitis expert at Public Health England, said: "While there would be a financial cost to rapidly increasing treatment rates, the increase is not as great as you might think, because the costs of managing undiagnosed and untreated hepatitis C are so high."

It is estimated that up to nine out of ten cases of hepatitis C are caused by injecting illegal drugs. The remainder result from sexual transmission or other forms of contact with infected body fluids.