Panel warns of explosion in
hepatitis C deaths
Current treatment 'disappointing,'
federal panel says
March 26, 1997
Web posted at: 9:30 p.m. EST
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Nearly four
million Americans, and 200 million
people worldwide, are infected with
hepatitis C, a blood-borne virus that
might someday scar their livers so badly
that they'll need a transplant to
survive.
Trouble is, most of the people who
are infected don't even know it. Even if
they did, current treatments are not
effective for most patients. And over
the next 20 years, the number of deaths
attributable to hepatitis C in the
United States will triple, to an
estimated 24,000 a year, unless more
effective treatments are found.
That cautionary assessment came
Wednesday from a National Institutes of
Health panel, convened to evaluate the
current understanding, diagnosis and
treatment of hepatitis C.
"There is a large reservoir of
patients with chronic [hepatitis C]
disease who will become ill, require
liver transplants or die," said Dr. D.W.
Powell of the University of Texas
Medical Branch at Galveston, who chaired
the panel.
The panel concluded that current
methods of treating the disease have
been "disappointing" because only one
out of five patients who develop the
chronic phase of the disease can be
cured. They called for more research
into drugs to combat the virus.
Intravenous drug use spreads
infection
Hepatitis C is spread most commonly
by needle sharing among intravenous drug
users. Snorting cocaine and having
multiple sex partners are also
considered risk factors. But there are a
number of other methods of transmission
involving more mainstream activities.
For instance, Constance Petrides, a
38-year-old woman infected with the
virus, says she believes she was
infected by having an ear pierced.
Theoretically, hepatitis C can also
be spread to recipients of blood
transfusions. In the U.S. though, this
route of transmission has become very
uncommon because of a blood test that
detects the disease in donors.
Edith Jackson Thomas, 45, thinks she
got the disease more than 20 years ago
when she was a lab technician.
"We did not use gloves because we
were not aware of the existence of
hepatitis C," she said.
Vaccines are available to protect
against two other common strains of
hepatitis, hepatitis A and B. But there
is currently no vaccine for hepatitis C.
Symptoms include fatigue, nausea,
loss of appetite
After infection, hepatitis C can
appear benign, with few visible signs of
illness for years or even decades.
Symptoms, when they do occur, include
extreme fatigue, loss of appetite,
nausea and abdominal pain. About 15
percent of those infected recover
completely without medical intervention.
The rest develop a chronic liver
infection. And while the health of most
of these people may not be seriously
affected, they remain carriers of the
virus, able to infect others.
For about 20 percent of people
infected with hepatitis C, the
consequences are more serious. They will
develop chronic liver diseases, the
leading reason for liver transplants in
the United States. Many develop
cirrhosis of the liver, which is often
fatal.
Principal method of treatment
The principal drugs used to treat
hepatitis C are all based on interferon,
an immune system protein produced by the
body to fight viral infections.
Treatment requires injections three
times a week for six months to a year.
The NIH panel found that the longer
course of treatment seems to be more
effective. Perhaps as many as 30 percent
of patients could be cured if they
stayed on interferon for a year, the
panel concluded.
Because of the limited efficacy of
current treatment, the panel called for
limiting use of interferon therapy only
to patients who have signs of
progressive cirrhosis.
Correspondent Eugenia Halsey
contributed to this report.
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