On the occasion of its Scientific Days, which will be held in early October, the French Society of Hepatology launches an alert regarding hepatitis C. This disease, which causes cirrhosis and liver cancer if it is not detected in time, still kills 2,500 people each year in France. However, according to scientists, nearly 75,000 people are unaware that they are carriers of the virus.
A disease that is transmitted through the blood
The hepatitis C virus is transmitted mainly through the blood, i.e. during sharing of the same syringe in drug addicts, either by direct contact with the blood of an infected person (cut, wound) or during contact with an object soiled with blood. The disease is much more rarely transmitted sexually.
Doctors from the French Hepatology Society are therefore calling for the establishment of a vast information campaign on hepatitis C but also for organized screening (as is the case for the breast cancer where the Colon Cancer for example) since only one in ten infected people know they are infected and have access to treatment.
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