Congress Offers Free Hepatitis Tests

Rep. Hank Johnson (D-Ga.), who once battled and overcame hepatitis C, is now a champion for early hepatitis testing. Members of the House offered free screenings for hepatitis B and hepatitis C on May 23 in honor of National Hepatitis Awareness Month. (Hank Johnson)

Legislators publicize condition during National Hepatitis Awareness Month

By Ron Dory, Epoch Times | May 28, 2013

Last Updated: May 28, 2013 8:31 pm

WASHINGTON—Members of the House offered free screenings for hepatitis B and hepatitis C on May 23 in honor of National Hepatitis Awareness Month. Many people who are infected do not know they have the illness.

“For years, I, too, was unaware. But I was tested, sought treatment, and I am very fortunate to have beaten this disease. I am living proof that testing saves lives,” said Rep. Hank Johnson (D-Ga.), who has recovered from hepatitis C. Rep. Johnson is a champion of hepatitis C awareness campaigns and an advocate of testing.

The illness often has no symptoms, but if it is diagnosed early, medications can save lives, according to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC). Untreated hepatitis can cause liver damage, cirrhosis, and cancer. Of the more than 5.3 million people in the U.S. with hepatitis B and/or hepatitis C, 65 to 75 percent are not aware they are infected, according to Johnson’s constituent newsletter.

All baby boomers, born between 1945 and 1965, should be tested, according to the CDC. All Americans of Asian heritage should also be tested, according to the CDC.

The National Viral Hepatitis Roundtable, the Hepatitis B Initiative of Washington, D.C., and the Congressional Viral Hepatitis Caucus presented the testing event, one of many other events raising awareness of the disease this month.

Congressmen Johnson, Bill Cassidy, Charlie Dent and Mike Honda, along with Ron Valdiserri, Deputy Assistant Secretary for Health & Human Services and John Ward, Director of the Division of Hepatitis at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention attended.

House staffers, including security guards, took the tests.

Volunteers and supporters of the Hepatitis B Initiative of Washington, D.C., (HBI-DC) gathered for its third annual gala fundraiser on May 19 at China Garden restaurant in Rossyln. Community partners, corporate and individual donors, and doctors and nurses who provide free screening and vaccinations recognized HBI-DC’s accomplishments.

Half of all Americans with hepatitis B are Asian-American and Pacific Islanders, according to the CDC. Approximately one in 12 AAPIs have chronic hepatitis B.

Hepatitis is defined as an inflammation of the liver, but the word also refers to strains of viruses that affect the liver, including liver cancer, according to the CDC. Being blood borne, hepatitis B can be transmitted from an infected mother to her child at birth.

When Dr. Mark Li, physician and president of the Association of Chinese American Physicians Mid-Atlantic Chapter first began to advocate for hepatitis B screening, the disease was little known in the Asian community, according to Li, and hepatitis B and C advocates did not work together. He has worked to change that, and made progress.

“I was invited by the American Liver Foundation to do an event in Congress in 2009,” said Li.

In addition to advocating, Li has conducted research on hepatitis B. His Maryland hepatitis B project connected Asian-American doctors, and the results were published in a journal for the National Medical Association in 2007. HBI-DC presented Li with an award to recognize his pro bono work screening, educating, and vaccinating people for hepatitis B .

In D.C., funding is limited for hepatitis B testing programs, according Yujiang Jia, chief epidemiologist with the Washington D.C., Department of Health HIV/AIDS Administration. However, the city offers vaccinations for hepatitis free of charge through the Department of Health Immunization Program.

Pharmaceutical drug maker AbbVie announced early this month that its hepatitis C virus infection treatment has been designated as a breakthrough therapy by the Food and Drug administration.

The breakthrough therapy designation is intended to expedite the development and review of drugs for life-threatening conditions. The all-oral 12-week treatment is in phase three testing in which the drug is administered to people who are closely monitored. It’s the last step before a drug becomes available to the public.

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May Is Hepatitis Awareness Month

April 30, 2012

By Ronald Valdiserri, M.D., M.P.H., Deputy Assistant Secretary for Health, Infectious Diseases, and Director, Office of HIV/AIDS and Infectious Disease Policy, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services; and John Ward, MD, Director, Division of Viral Hepatitis, National Center for HIV/AIDS, Viral Hepatitis, STD, and TB Prevention, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

Every May, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), and our public health partners across the nation observe Hepatitis Awareness Month. This year, we are very pleased to be marking this observance during a time of increased awareness about and collaboration around viral hepatitis –due in large part to the work of our federal partners over the past year on the implementation of the Action Plan for the Prevention, Care and Treatment of Viral Hepatitis.

Developed by an inter-agency working group and announced last May by Dr. Howard Koh, Assistant Secretary for Health, the Action Plan details steps to increase viral hepatitis awareness and knowledge among healthcare providers and communities and strategies to improve access to quality prevention, care, and treatment services for persons living with viral hepatitis. For the past year, we have been collaborating with our colleagues across HHS, as well as from the Department of Veterans Affairs and Department of Justice’s Federal Bureau of Prisons, to pursue the strategies detailed in the Action Plan. Together, we are working to ensure that new cases of viral hepatitis are prevented and that persons who are already infected are tested, informed about their infection, and provided with counseling, care, and treatment.

Learn More About Viral Hepatitis Risks, Tests and Treatment
An estimated 3.5–5.3 million Americans are living with chronic (lifelong) hepatitis B or hepatitis C virus infection. Most of them do not know that they are infected, placing them at greater risk for severe, even fatal, complications from the disease and increasing the likelihood that they will spread the virus to others. We encourage you to use Hepatitis Awareness Month to learn more about this “silent epidemic.” One place to start learning more is CDC’s Hepatitis Awareness Month webpage. Check back over the course of the month as exciting new resources and tools are added to this page. The CDCNPIN webpage is another important resource, where federal partners working to implement the Action Plan have posted downloadable materials designed to educate the public, patients, and providers about viral hepatitis. Select “hepatitis” as your topic and add relevant keywords below, such as “testing,” “treatment,” or “Asian American,” and you will get a list of materials to read and share with others.

Inaugural Hepatitis Testing Day Coming on May 19
As called for in the Action Plan, May 19th has been designated as Hepatitis Testing Day in the United States. Coinciding with Hepatitis Awareness Month, this inaugural Hepatitis Testing Day offers an important opportunity to remind healthcare providers and educate the public about who should be tested for viral hepatitis. We’ll be sharing more about this observance in a blog post later this month. In the meantime, to learn more and start thinking about how you and your organization can participate in promoting viral hepatitis awareness and testing, visit CDC’s Hepatitis Testing Day webpage.

We hope you will join with us in promoting both important observances as a way to enhance public awareness of viral hepatitis prevention, testing, care and treatment across the United States. Won’t you please commit to learning more yourself and/or sharing information about viral hepatitis with at least two other people? They can be family, friends, co-workers or neighbors. Working together, we can end the silence around this epidemic and in so doing, make great strides in improving the health of persons who are at risk for or living with viral hepatitis.

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