Viral hepatitis appears on World Health Assembly agenda for first time

"The World Health Organization is being urged to step up the fight against viral hepatitis and develop a comprehensive approach to its prevention and treatment, with a resolution on the disease to be presented to the 63rd World Health Assembly later this month.

This will be the first time that the assembly has considered viral hepatitis, despite the huge burden of disease worldwide, said Steven Wiersma, medical officer and hepatitis focal point at WHO's headquarters in Geneva.

"One in 12 people in the world are chronically infected with hepatitis B [and] the burden is extraordinarily high, yet somehow it's been left off the world's public health agenda," he said.^"