Health experts are calling for urgent action to tackle viral hepatitis in Africa, where the disease silently killed more than 300,000 people in 2022, making it one of the continent’s deadliest but most overlooked public health threats.
“Hepatitis is more common than people realise, yet it’s one of the least understood infectious diseases,” said Allan Pamba, executive vice president for Africa at Roche Diagnostics. “We are at a fork in the road, and we now have the opportunity to part ways with this epidemic.”
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Despite the availability of affordable diagnostics, vaccines and treatments, hepatitis B and C remain under-prioritised in public health programs across much of the region, often overshadowed by HIV, tuberculosis and malaria.
The World Health Organization aims to eliminate hepatitis as a public health threat by 2030, but Africa’s progress remains uneven.
Egypt offers a rare success story. Its 2018 “100 Million Healthy Lives” campaign screened over 60 million people and treated more than 4 million for hepatitis C. In 2023, Egypt became the first country globally to achieve WHO’s “Gold Tier” elimination status.
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“The lesson is simple: when governments lead boldly and partner strategically, scale works,” Pamba said.
Other countries including Nigeria, Kenya and Rwanda have expanded hepatitis B birth-dose vaccination and increased access to diagnostics. Still, many people remain undiagnosed due to lack of routine screening and awareness. The disease often remains asymptomatic until liver damage or cancer sets in.
Roche’s awareness campaign has sought to humanise the threat, featuring patients like Mary, a retired teacher in Nairobi, and Michael, a pharmacy technician in Abuja, who both manage hepatitis B thanks to early diagnosis and treatment.
Experts argue that the infrastructure used for HIV, TB and COVID-19 testing can also be leveraged for hepatitis. What’s needed, they say, is greater political will, targeted funding, and integration of testing into antenatal and community health services.
“This can be the decade where the silence ends and the year Africa leads,” Pamba said.
