Finding the Missing Millions. Mothers and the spread of Hepatitis.

Hepatitis causes over one million deaths world-wide every year, and climbing. Combatting the problem is difficult because many carriers of the disease are asymptomatic. But there are ways to combat the problem.

Hepatitis virus can be transmitted from mother to child. Source: Photo by Sanofi Pasteur/Creative Commons.

Dr Irsan Hasan, Chairperson of the Indonesian Association of Liver Researchers explains a number of difficulties in fighting Hepatitis.  He stresses the importance of widespread mandatory screening and testing to prevent the spread of hepatitis, especially the high incidence of mother to child transmission.

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according to an American Academy of Paediatrics (AAP) policy, the first dose of the hepatitis B vaccine should be given within the first 24 hours of life. Source: Image by wuestinigel /Creative Commons.