In this file photo, a health worker gives a hepatitis vaccination to a flood affected boy at a makeshift school on higher ground in southern Sindh. — AFP
KARACHI: Health experts and medical scientists have warned that the hepatitis B and C viral infections are a “pandemic within a pandemic”, which are claiming three to four times more lives in Pakistan than Covid-19. They called for immediate measures for the prevention, screening and treatment of the disease.
They were speaking at an awareness session held on Tuesday at the Karachi Press Club in collaboration with Pakistan GI and Liver Diseases Society (PGLDS) in connection with World Hepatitis Day 2021, to highlight the global burden of viral hepatitis and to call for its elimination from the world by 2030. They stressed the need to have equal focus on hepatitis B and C.