. "1 Introduction." Hepatitis and Liver Cancer: A National Strategy for Prevention and Control of Hepatitis B and C. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press, 2010.
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Hepatitis and Liver Cancer: A National Strategy for Prevention and Control of Hepatitis B and C
TABLE 1-1 Key Characteristics of Hepatitis B and Hepatitis C
Hepatitis B
Hepatitis C
Causative agent
Partially double-stranded DNA virus
Enveloped, positive-strand RNA virus
Hepadnaviridae family
Hepacavirus genus, Flaviviridae family
Statistics
In the United States, 0.8–1.4 million people are chronically infected with HBV
In the United States, 2.7–3.9 million people are chronically infected with HCV
Routes of transmission
Contact with infectious blood, semen, and other body fluids, primarily through:
Birth to an infected mother
Sexual contact with an infected person
Sharing of contaminated needles, syringes, or other injection-drug equipment
Contact with blood of an infected person, primarily through:
Sharing of contaminated needles, syringes, or other injection-drug equipment
Less commonly through:
Sexual contact with an infected person
Birth to an infected mother
Contact with infectious blood through medical procedures
Less commonly through:
Contact with infectious blood through medical procedures
Persons at risk
Persons born in geographic regions that have HBsAg prevalence of at least 2%
Infants born to infected mothers
Household contacts of persons who have chronic HBV infection
Sex partners of infected persons
Injection-drug users
Sexually active persons who are not in long-term, mutually monogamous relationships (for example, more than one sex partner during previous 6 months)
Men who have sex with men
Persons who have ever injected illegal drugs, including those who injected only once many years ago
Recipients of clotting-factor concentrates made before 1987
Recipients of blood transfusions or solid-organ transplants before July 1992
Patients who have ever received long-term hemodialysis treatment
Persons who have known exposures to HCV, such as health-care workers after needlesticks involving HCV-positive blood and recipients of blood or organs from donors who later tested HCV-positive
