TY - JOUR
T1 - The case for simplifying and using absolute targets for viral hepatitis elimination goals
AU - Polaris Observatory Collaborators
AU - Razavi, Homie
AU - Blach, Sarah
AU - Razavi-Shearer, Devin
AU - Abaalkhail, Faisal
AU - Abbas, Zaigham
AU - Abdallah, Ayat
AU - Abrao Ferreira, Paulo
AU - Abu Raddad, Laith Jamal
AU - Adda, Danjuma
AU - Agarwal, Kosh
AU - Aghemo, Alessio
AU - Ahmed, Aijaz
AU - Al-Busafi, Said A.
AU - Al-hamoudi, Waleed
AU - Al-Kaabi, Saad
AU - Al-Romaihi, Hamad
AU - Aljarallah, Badr
AU - AlNaamani, Khalid
AU - Alqahtani, Saleh
AU - Alswat, Khalid
AU - Altraif, Ibrahim
AU - Asselah, Tarik
AU - Bacon, Bruce
AU - Bessone, Fernando
AU - Bizri, Abdul Rahman
AU - Block, Tim
AU - Bonino, Ferruccio
AU - Brandão-Mello, Carlos Eduardo
AU - Brown, Kimberly
AU - Bruggmann, Philip
AU - Brunetto, Maurizia Rossana
AU - Buti, Maria
AU - Cabezas, Joaquín
AU - Calleja, Jose Luis
AU - Castro Batänjer, Erika
AU - Chan, Henry Lik Yuen
AU - Chang, Henry
AU - Chen, Chien Jen
AU - Christensen, Peer Brehm
AU - Chuang, Wan Long
AU - Cisneros, Laura
AU - Cohen, Chari
AU - Colombo, Massimo
AU - Conway, Brian
AU - Cooper, Curtis
AU - Craxi, Antonio
AU - Crespo, Javier
AU - Croes, Esther
AU - Cryer, Donna
AU - Flamm, Steven
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2020 John Wiley & Sons Ltd
PY - 2021/1
Y1 - 2021/1
N2 - The 69th World Health Assembly endorsed the Global Health Sector Strategy for Viral Hepatitis, embracing a goal to eliminate hepatitis infection as a public health threat by 2030. This was followed by the World Health Organization's (WHO) global targets for the care and management of hepatitis B virus (HBV) and hepatitis C virus (HCV) infections. These announcements and targets were important in raising awareness and calling for action; however, tracking countries’ progress towards these elimination goals has provided insights to the limitations of these targets. The existing targets compare a country's progress relative to its 2015 values, penalizing countries who started their programmes prior to 2015, countries with a young population, or countries with a low prevalence. We recommend that (1) WHO simplify the hepatitis elimination targets, (2) change to absolute targets and (3) allow countries to achieve these disease targets with their own service coverage initiatives that will have the maximum impact. The recommended targets are as follows: reduce HCV new chronic cases to ≤5 per 100 000, reduce HBV prevalence among 1-year-olds to ≤0.1%, reduce HBV and HCV mortality to ≤5 per 100 000, and demonstrate HBV and HCV year-to-year decrease in new HCV- and HBV-related HCC cases. The objective of our recommendations is not to lower expectations or diminish the hepatitis elimination standards, but to provide clearer targets that recognize the past and current elimination efforts by countries, help measure progress towards true elimination, and motivate other countries to follow suit.
AB - The 69th World Health Assembly endorsed the Global Health Sector Strategy for Viral Hepatitis, embracing a goal to eliminate hepatitis infection as a public health threat by 2030. This was followed by the World Health Organization's (WHO) global targets for the care and management of hepatitis B virus (HBV) and hepatitis C virus (HCV) infections. These announcements and targets were important in raising awareness and calling for action; however, tracking countries’ progress towards these elimination goals has provided insights to the limitations of these targets. The existing targets compare a country's progress relative to its 2015 values, penalizing countries who started their programmes prior to 2015, countries with a young population, or countries with a low prevalence. We recommend that (1) WHO simplify the hepatitis elimination targets, (2) change to absolute targets and (3) allow countries to achieve these disease targets with their own service coverage initiatives that will have the maximum impact. The recommended targets are as follows: reduce HCV new chronic cases to ≤5 per 100 000, reduce HBV prevalence among 1-year-olds to ≤0.1%, reduce HBV and HCV mortality to ≤5 per 100 000, and demonstrate HBV and HCV year-to-year decrease in new HCV- and HBV-related HCC cases. The objective of our recommendations is not to lower expectations or diminish the hepatitis elimination standards, but to provide clearer targets that recognize the past and current elimination efforts by countries, help measure progress towards true elimination, and motivate other countries to follow suit.
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U2 - 10.1111/jvh.13412
DO - 10.1111/jvh.13412
M3 - Article
C2 - 32979881
AN - SCOPUS:85098674981
SN - 1352-0504
VL - 28
SP - 12
EP - 19
JO - Journal of Viral Hepatitis
JF - Journal of Viral Hepatitis
IS - 1
ER -