8 out 10 people with hepatitis C do not know they are infected.1
Hepatitis C is an inflammatory liver disease caused by infection with the Hepatitis C Virus (HCV). HCV can cause both acute and chronic hepatitis resulting in long-term consequences for patients including fibrosis, cirrhosis, liver cancer and death.2
Tremendous diagnostic and therapeutic advances have been made since the discovery of HCV in 1989.3 Since 2016, the availability of highly efficacious therapies, based on direct-acting antivirals, mean that more than 95% of people can be considered cured after treatment.4 And yet, the hepatitis C disease burden is still significant – across the world, 58 million people are living with chronic HCV infection.1 In 2019 alone, there were 1.5 million new infections and 290,000 people died from HCV infection-related causes.1