Most of the victims, who died prematurely as young men and women, suffered  from liver failure and liver cancer.

The Director-General of the Ghana Health Service, Dr Patrick Kuma-Aboagye, who disclosed this at the Ghana Hepatitis Stakeholders' Conference 2024 in Accra yesterday, explained that Ghana had 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.

The high burden, he explained, appeared to be disproportionately shared between the northern and southern parts of the country, with the northern part having a higher burden.

The conference was organised by the Ghana Health Service (GHS) in partnership with the Hepatitis Foundation of Ghana and Abbot Diagnostics on the theme, “mobilising partnerships for viral hepatitis elimination in Ghana”.

It was aimed at increasing the awareness of stakeholders about hepatitis and also enabling them to appreciate the work ahead so that they can support the country in meeting its obligation to eliminate the disease. 

Hepatitis

Hepatitis is the condition that results when the liver is inflamed or when the liver is infected by disease-causing microorganisms. Hepatitis is very broad and includes viral hepatitis, alcoholic hepatitis and pathogens that cause hepatitis.

Within viral hepatitis, there is Hepatitis A, B, C, D and E.  

An estimate published in 2016 put the prevalence rate of hepatitis in the country at 12.3 per cent, which was far above the eight per cent prevalence threshold.

Dr Kuma-Aboagye said even though the country 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 eight per cent of new babies were born to mothers who tested positive for Hepatitis B at the antenatal clinics.

He further said there was a higher risk of transmission from mother to the baby, depending on the virus type and other factors.

He said eliminating Hepatitis B required concerted, coordinated and accountable interventions, and therefore, encouraged stakeholders to engage the control programme to identify available gaps in helping the country to eliminate the disease.

Worldwide

The World Health Organisation (WHO) Representative to Ghana, Dr Frank Lule, said worldwide, about 300 million people live with the disease, with more than a million new infections being recorded every year and more than a million deaths.

“If you divide that, we are getting more than 3,000 people dying every day because of chronic viral hepatitis. And we are at a time when we have so many tools at our disposal to do something about the disease.

“We now have the diagnostics. The medicines available to us have never been cheaper than what they are now so I think we are at a time when we can really do something about this,” he said.

The Egyptian Ambassador to Ghana, A. M. Youssef, said some low and middle-income countries such as Egypt and Georgia had been able to eliminate Hepatitis C, and as such he was hopeful that Ghana would also succeed in doing so in a better way.

He said in the case of Egypt eliminating the disease, they embarked on an aggressive screening and treatment programme that evolved into a national strategy.

A Deputy Minister of Health, Alexander Kwasi Acquah, said eliminating the disease required more partnerships, and therefore, commended all partners for their support in the fight against the disease, including the government of Egypt, which delivered Hepatitis C medicines, coupled with its  readiness to offer technical assistance to Ghana.

He said  the ministry would open dialogue with the Ministry of Finance to mobilise domestic resources and create the needed fiscal space to fund viral hepatitis elimination.