Abstract
Hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection and its related liver diseases are important health problems worldwide, particularly in the Asia-Pacific region. For the past 4–5 decades, Taiwan’s government and scientists have cooperated together to control this virus infection and its related liver diseases. These efforts and achievements have made progress toward the elimination of HBV. Taiwan’s government initiated the Viral Hepatitis Control Program (VHCP) in the1970s, and then launched the national vaccination program in 1984. This universal vaccination program effectively decreased the rate of hepatitis B carriage and the development of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) in the younger generation. Since 2003, approved anti-HBV treatments were reimbursed nationwide. This reimbursement program resulted in a higher uptake of anti-HBV treatments, which contributed to a decrease in liver-related disease progression and subsequently reduced attributable mortality in Taiwan. This experience can be shared by countries in other parts of the world regarding the control of chronic viral hepatitis B.
Highlights
Hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection is an important public health problem worldwide
Mother-to-infant transmission (MIT) of HBV was found to result in a high rate of chronic hepatitis B surface antigen (HBsAg) carriage, and is a major route of HBV transmission in HBV-endemic countries [10,26]
The efficacy of the vaccination program was evaluated 18 months after the launch of the program; 85% of the infants born to HBsAg carrier mothers were protected from chronic HBV infection [15]
Summary
Hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection is an important public health problem worldwide. This etiologic agent was not identified until 1965, when Baruch S. An extremely high rate of HBsAg carriage in the general population (15–20%) was noted from epidemiology studies around 1975; about 80% of the patients with hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) were found to be HBsAg positive [4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11] Because of this serious health problem, the Taiwanese government organized a Viral Hepatitis Control Committee in 1981 to supervise and coordinate disease control policies. Following the recommendation of the Viral Hepatitis Control Committee, the Taiwanese government approved a nationwide reimbursement program for these two regimens for chronic hepatitis B patients in 2003 These measures have made progress toward the elimination of HBV in Taiwan [3,25]. We would like to report our experiences with other countries with endemic HBV infection
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