Children more vulnerable to chronic hepatitis 'B' than adults

Ejisu (Ash), April 30, GNA - Young children who become infected with the Hepatitis 'B' Virus (HBV) are most likely to develop chronic (lifelong) infection, Dr Emmanuel Ahiable, Medical Superintendent of the Asante-Mampong District Hospital, has said.

He said about 90 per cent of infants infected with HBV during their first year of life and 30 to 50 per cent of children infected between one to four years of age would develop chronic infection. Again, the risk of death from hepatitis 'B' related liver cancer is about 25 per cent for persons who become chronically infected during childhood.

Dr Ahiable was delivering an awareness creation talk on the virus for seminarians of the Spiritan Institute of the Mampong-Konongo Catholic Diocese at Ejisu at the weekend. The Medical Superintendent said increasing cases of hepatitis 'B' were now diagnosed in health facilities, pointing out that the disease had become a serious public health problem, especially in poor countries.

"The good news though is that, unlike many other viral diseases, hepatitis 'B' is preventable with a safe and effective vaccine that are now available", he said. According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), "of the more than two billion people who have been infected with the hepatitis 'B' virus worldwide, close to 350 million have developed chronic (lifelong) infection".

These chronically infected persons, according to medical scientists, are high risk of death from cirrhosis of the liver and liver cancer.

Dr Ahiable said hepatitis 'B' was transmitted by contact with blood or body fluids of an infected person similar to the transmission of HIV, adding that HBV was, however, 50 to 100 times more infectious than HIV. He said the main ways of getting infected with the virus were from mother to baby at birth, child-to-child transmission, unsafe injections and transfusions and sexual contacts. Dr Ahiable also pointed out that the virus could not be spread by contaminated food or water and could not also be spread through casual contact at the workplace. He urged the seminarians to share this information with their colleagues, families and congregation to stem the increasing spread of the disease. 30 April 06