The Ministry of Public Health and its partners participate in the celebration of the World Viral Hepatitis Day, which falls on the twenty-eighth of July every year, and is held this year under the slogan “For a future free from hepatitis”, with a focus on protecting mothers and newborns from hepatitis B virus. .
World Hepatitis Day is an opportunity to reinforce efforts to implement the first global strategy developed by the World Health Organization on viral hepatitis for the period 2016-2021 and help countries achieve the ultimate goal of eliminating hepatitis.
The fight against hepatitis is one of the priorities of the health system in the State of Qatar in light of the complications that result from infection such as cirrhosis, liver failure and liver cancer, and it is a complication that is difficult to treat and a major burden on the health system, and the State of Qatar adopts a strategic approach to control and eliminate hepatitis Viral through the joint efforts of the Ministry of Public Health, the Hamad Medical Corporation, primary health care, the Qatari Red Crescent, the private sector and many local and international partners.
The Ministry of Public Health, the Hamad Medical Corporation, the Primary Health Care Foundation and national partners are keen to implement awareness-raising campaigns about the disease, as well as a number of early screening campaigns for hepatitis C, which have shown a low incidence of this disease, as the prevalence of inflammation Liver of type (C) /0.8/ per cent among the entire population, and this percentage reached / 0.25 / per cent only among Qatari citizens. The State of Qatar is classified according to the World Health Organization as one of the countries with a low burden of hepatitis (B) as it reaches The prevalence rate is less than 2%.
It is mentioned that if any of the cases with hepatitis are monitored, they will be transferred to the Hamad Medical Corporation, where they were treated with the latest and most effective medical drugs for the treatment of hepatitis C, known as “direct-acting anti-viral drugs”, which Qatar provides free to all Citizens and residents through the Department of Hepatology at the Hamad Medical Corporation, in cooperation with the Qatari Red Crescent, the private sector and many partners in the country. So far, more than 4000 patients have been treated in the Hepatology Unit at Hamad Medical Corporation and very high cure rates have been achieved.
The National Working Group for Hepatitis C, which includes all the effective partners in combating the disease in the State of Qatar, has conducted many scientific research in cooperation with prominent international institutions and has been published in the most prestigious international scientific journals and presented in a number of international conferences, where the State of Qatar has received many international acclaim Through scientific reports presented at the World Hepatitis Summit in Brazil early November 2017, which indicated that Qatar is among the 9 countries in the world that is on the right path to eliminate the hepatitis C virus by 2030.
It is noteworthy that the State of Qatar, in cooperation with the World Health Organization, set the strategic framework to combat hepatitis in the country for the period 2018-2022. All preventive and curative hepatitis services and achieve universal coverage of these services while providing the necessary resources.
The strategic framework for combating hepatitis focuses on the implementation of the goals related to the National Health Strategy 2018-2022 and the Public Health Strategy 2017-2022, and the strategic framework has been adopted by officials of the National Program to Fight Hepatitis.
