We will be adding a hepatitis C antibody test to the annual blood tests of most everyone over 50 or so.
Recent public health recommendations are to screen everyone born from 1945 to 1965 for this chronic and insidious infection. The 1980s were the peak decade for hepatitis C exposure, both witting and unwitting, through various forms of misbehavior, mainly drugs. However, such risky behaviour was a bit more widespread in time, so in practice we will screen a somewhat wider age group.
The impetus for screening is partly that the liver damage from hepatitis C, which takes decades to develop, is now showing up widely. The main reason, though, is much more positive. Our new treatments for hepatitis C, both those available now and those about to come out, are dramatically more effective in eradicating the infection, in a shorter time period and with less collateral damage during the treatment period.
