World Hepatitis Day 2008

(Copied direct from the Hep C Trust website)

 

The Hepatitis C Trust is proud to support World Hepatitis Day – taking place on Monday 19th May 2008. Together with over 200 patient groups from around the world we are pledging our support to the first truly global awareness event for chronic viral hepatitis B and C. In recent years hepatitis patient groups have attempted to raise awareness by co-ordinating awareness activities around a specific day, notably October 1st. However, despite some success, these initiatives have never been truly global, the North and South American patient groups, for example, being unable, for various reasons, to participate on October 1st. Furthermore, these initiatives have not always been driven by the patient groups themselves. Patient group representatives from North America, South America, Europe, North Africa, Australasia and China therefore met in Barcelona in April 2007 to commit to a new global initiative. The necessity of a single awareness day to act as a focus was agreed and May 19th. In order to oversee World Hepatitis Day and to ensure that it is a patient-led initiative, the World Hepatitis Alliance was established in Geneva with a governing board of patient representatives, one from each of 6 world regions, and a president representing the totality of hepatitis patients. During the summer of 2007 the Alliance asked 12 worldwide communications agencies to pitch to run the World Hepatitis Day campaign and chose Fleishman-Hillard.  

Campaign Theme for 2008

The campaign focuses on the size of chronic viral hepatitis as a health challenge using a simple message: ‘Am I number 12?’ to highlight that approximately 1 in 12 of the world population has chronic HBV or HCV infection, that infection is often undiagnosed and that it could be any one of us (as opposed to some other group).  

Campaign Aims

The aims of this single international day focusing on chronic viral hepatitis (B & C) are to: Raise awareness of these diseases within the general public, people at risk, healthcare providers and government audiences. Provide an overall theme within which patient groups in each country can highlight particular national needs. Because this is a patient-led campaign, much of the campaign material is devoted to supporting patient groups in delivering whatever message they decide is appropriate for their country. Persuade national governments to commit to ‘12 Asks’ by 2012 (see below for more details). Governments with good hepatitis programmes will be encouraged to become ‘early adopters’ and have their work show-cased. Draw together data not just on prevalence and incidence but also on best practice and barriers to improved outcomes in a ‘Hepatitis Atlas’ Have the WHO officially adopt World Hepatitis Day, ideally at the 2009 General Assembly

12 Asks

Governments are being asked to commit to putting in place 12 constituents of an effective hepatitis programme. They are initially being asked to commit to them by 2012 with no fixed date for actioning them. Of course, some countries will find this much easier than others and part of our work in the future will be forming partnerships to make these commitments possible.

6 of the 12 are universal for all countries:

Public recognition of chronic viral hepatitis as an urgent public health issue

The appointment of an individual to lead Government strategy nationally

The development of a patient pathway for screening, diagnosis, referral and treatment

Clear, quantifiable targets for reducing incidence and prevalence

Clear, quantifiable targets for reducing mortality

Clear, quantifiable targets for screening

A further 6 will be tailored to the circumstances of each individual country. An example would be:

Commitment to an ongoing national vaccination programme

Effective surveillance and publication of national incidence and prevalence statistics Commitment to examine cases of best practice internationally

Commitment to work with patient groups in policy design and implementation Provision of free and anonymous (or confidential) testing

A public awareness campaign that alerts people to the issue and is committed to reducing stigma

Public Health Panel

We have established a small public health panel of experts to provide advice and support:

Prof Baruch Blumberg (N America) Dr Leonardo Pinchuk (Latin America) Dr Miguel Garassini (Latin America) Dr João Mendonça (Latin America) Prof Stefan Zeuzem (Europe) Prof Jean-Michel Pawlotsky (Europe) Prof S P Singh (S E Asia) Prof Dong Jin Suh (W Pacific) Prof Hui Zhuang (W Pacific) Prof Driss Jamil (N Africa) Prof Gamal Esmat (N Africa) Prof Greg Dore (Australiasia) Partnerships We are in discussions with major global institutions involved in the health field including, WHO, the Gates Foundation, OSI, UNICEF and the Red Cross and have so far received endorsements from the Clinton Foundation, CDC and Médecins Sans Frontières. We are also in discussions with the major clinical bodies involved with hepatitis such as EASL, AASLD and APASL and have so far received confirmed endorsement from ALEH, the Latin American Association for the Study of the Liver. Funding

Funding has been sought from a wide range of sponsors. So far it has been received from 8 competing pharmaceutical companies that manufacture drugs for the treatment of HBV or HCV or both – BMS, Gilead, GSK, Janssen-Cilag, Lab 21, Novartis, Roche and Schering-Plough – and also from Shell Trading, ClearChannel and the financial information provider, Bloomberg.