According to the data of the European Surveillance, a decrease of 10% is seen in the cases of one of the most severe diseases known as Hepatitis C during the year 2016- 2017.
Since 2011 European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) has coordinated increased surveillance for Hepatitis B and C to define transmission patterns or epidemiological trends among the newly diagnosed cases.
The latest surveillance data of the European Economic Area/European Union (EEA/EU) show that it is still quite difficult in many countries to diagnose the stages of the Hepatitis infection.
Information about whether the infection is an acute one or a chronic one is only available in one out of four registered cases.
Based on surveys, the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) has estimated that about 5.6 million Europeans live with Hepatitis C in the European Union/European Economic Area.
Chronic Hepatitis C can cause severe diseases namely cancer and cirrhosis, but many infected persons keep living with it because of the lack of any symptoms.
Hepatitis c is a huge burden across Europe. Basically High HCV burden among people who inject drugs
The recent available data reflect that the highest rate of recently diagnosed cases of Hepatitis C virus is among the people between the age of 25- 44 years- a profile which is consistent with people who are drug addicts.
European countries, in order to control Hepatitis infections, need to strengthen local prevention and control all the practices as directed by the WHO’s European Action Plan for the health sector in order to control the Hepatitis B and C viral infections.