The Institute of Liver and Biliary Sciences has joined hands with the Delhi Metro Rail Corporation to start a campaign to spread awareness regarding Hepatitis C, which impacts an estimated 60 lakh to 1.1 crore persons annually in the country.
The campaign, titled 'Empowering People against Hepatitis: The Empathy Campaign', is aimed at spreading pan-India awareness on the menace of viral Hepatitis B and Hepatitis C diseases. It was formally launched at an event on Monday held at Metro Bhavan. More than 250 DMRC staff were screened on the occasion and were vaccinated in the health check-up camp soon after a pledge taking ceremony.
As per a 2014 study, the ones most at risk from Hepatitis C are people who inject drugs (PWID).
It said better tests to easily diagnose and monitor HCV are needed urgently to guide individual patient care and to test communities at risk, suggest doctors. "Injecting drug use is a major route of Hepatitis C virus (HCV) in north India, especially Punjab, which has very high rates of substance abuse. A study indicates there is an urgent need to expand HCV counseling and testing for IDUs in India, and to implement interventions that will decrease HCV associated injection risk behaviour in order to prevent a surge in the incidence of HIV infection in this population," said Dr Sanjay Sarin, head of operations, FIND India.