The Director-General of the Ghana Health Service, Dr Patrick Kuma-Aboagye, has said that 15,000 died from Hepatitis B and Hepatitis C- related liver diseases in 2022, indicating 42 deaths per day.
Speaking at the Ghana Hepatitis Stakeholders’ Conference 2024 in Accra yesterday, Dr Kuma-Aboagye said that most of the victims, who died prematurely as young men and women, suffered from liver failure and liver cancer.
He explained that Ghana has a high burden of predominantly chronic Hepatitis B, and to a lesser extent, chronic Hepatitis C, both of which caused significant illness and premature deaths from liver-related conditions for thousands of Ghanaians.
According to him, the high burden is disproportionately shared between the northern and southern parts of Ghana with the northern part having a higher burden.
Dr Kuma-Aboagye said that even though Ghana had a high burden of Hepatitis B and C, very few of these had been diagnosed due to low testing capacity and inadequate reporting.
He added that it had been estimated that every year, about 8 per cent of new babies were born to mothers who tested positive for Hepatitis B at the antenatal clinics and that there is a higher risk of transmission from mother to the baby, depending on the virus type and other factors.
The conference was organised by the Ghana Health Service (GHS) in partnership with the Hepatitis Foundation of Ghana and Abbot Diagnostics and it had the theme, “mobilising partnerships for viral hepatitis elimination in Ghana”.
GIK/APA