On the initiative of the epidemiology and preventive medicine service, the University Hospital Establishment (EHU) November 1, 1954 of Oran organizes, from Monday, a awareness campaign devoted to viral hepatitis. Multiservice mobilization to better inform the public about pathologies as discreet as it is dangerous.
For two days, citizens will be invited to learn about the different types of viral hepatitis A, B, C, D and E, their modes of transmission, the clinical signs to be monitored as well as the available prevention and treatment means. This action, relayed by the Algerian press agency (APS), is both educational and preventive as World Day against Hepatitis, celebrated on July 28. Several hospital services participate in this campaign, including bacteriology, gastroenterology, gynecology-obstetrics as well as the regional blood transfusion center.
Together, they aim to raise awareness of the general public, but also to recall healthcare professionals on vigilance on an often silent disease to an advanced stage. Professor Chafika Manouni, head of the gastroenterology service at EHU, took advantage of this opportunity to recall that “all the means of fighting hepatitis are available in Algeria”, both for diagnosis and for treatment. In particular, she pointed out that hepatitis B and C drugs, the most widespread in the country, are now locally manufactured, thus facilitating their accessibility.
Professor Manouni launched a clear appeal to patients: “We must turn to health professionals”, alerting the dangers of the use of traditional treatments, sometimes favored by certain fringes of the population. “Hepatitis A can cure spontaneously, but forms B and C can become chronic, or even evolve towards hepatic cirrhosis if they are not treated in time,” she warned. She also recalled that the healing chances of hepatitis B and C are very high, between 90 and 95%, provided that the management is fast and medical.
Diagnostic delay, often due to self -medication or popular beliefs, is a major obstacle to the eradication of these diseases. This campaign is part of a broader public health will to eradicate viral hepatitis as a threat to global health by 2030, the objective set by the World Health Organization. An ambition within the reach of Algerian health establishments, provided that awareness efforts encounter real citizen listening.