Although the history of epidemic jaundice can be traced to the Babylonian Talmud (5th-century bc ) and Hippocrates (460–375 bc ), the history of serum hepatitis (hepatitis B) is much shorter, with the earliest recognized outbreak among Bremen shipyard workers in 1883. The wide-scale introduction and common use of large syringes and long needles with the 1909 advent of salvarsan therapy in venereal disease clinics was soon followed by sudden outbreaks of jaundice. 23 During World War II (1939–1945), hepatitis became a serious problem in certain clinics. Large numbers of patients had venepunctures and received subcutaneous, intramuscular or intravenous injections. This was the case in diabetic clinics, sanatoria, arthritis clinics, and venereal disease treatment clinics for service personnel. On investigation, it was found that the incidence of hepatitis tended to be low in venereal disease clinics where the syringes were sterilized between patients, whereas it tended to be high in clinics where the syringes were merely washed. 10 The term homologous serum jaundice was introduced in Britain after the publication of a Ministry of Health Memorandum 11 describing the outbreak of jaundice and deaths that followed the subcutaneous administration of measles convalescent serum to children, which also had been recorded as early as 1938. Jaundice associated with immunization against yellow fever was recognized in 1937, but the largest outbreak of serum hepatitis (hepatitis B) was in 1942, when 28,585 American soldiers inoculated with yellow fever vaccine developed jaundice, and 62 died. 8 There was considerable evidence that the hepatitis was caused by a filterable agent present in the human serum and incorporated in the virus culture medium used for the preparation of the vaccine. Jaundice became recognized after the transfusion of plasma, reconstituted serum, 12 or whole blood. 1 The term hepatitis A, for infectious or epidemic hepatitis, and hepatitis B, for serum hepatitis or homologous serum jaundice, were introduced by MacCallum in 1947 9 and adopted by the Scientific Group on Viral Hepatitis of the World Health Organization in 1973. Blumberg's 2 discovery of the specific association of Australia antigen (hepatitis B surface antigen [HBsAg]) with hepatitis provided a specific serologic test for hepatitis B and a method of diagnosis and study of the epidemiology and prevention of this common and important infection. The rapid development of specific and sensitive laboratory tests of markers of infection with hepatitis B virus (HBV) provided the means of differentiating between hepatitis A and hepatitis B other than by the incubation period , confirmed the existence of the carrier state estimated conservatively to number 350 million carriers worldwide, identified the infection in every population studied, provided evidence that one third of the world population had been infected with this virus, with 1 to 2 million deaths annually, and identified the common modes of transmission of HBV. Much has been written during the last 3 decades on the complex epidemiology of hepatitis B , and an enormous bibliography has been accumulated on the subject. 5 , 6 , 7 , 20