Comprehensive Textbook of Hepatitis B PDF

Dynamic changes are taking place in control and management of different infectious diseases due to development of insights about epidemiology and pathogenesis of these diseases and also because various antimicrobial agents and vaccines have become available. Smallpox is a matter of history and has been completely eradicated from the world. Many infectious diseases are also going to be eradicated or effectively controlled in near future. However, these realities are not applicable to hepatitis B virus (HBV). The virus was detected in 1960s. A potent vaccine against the HBV was developed in the early 1980s, which is regarded one of the major successes in the field of vaccinology. The World Health Organization (WHO) has also recommended the universal use of HBV vaccines around the world and most of the countries of the world accepted the notion. After all these developments, about 2 billion people or about one-third of global population are infected with the HBV and about 350 million of these people are chronically infected with this virus.

About 75–80% of chronic HBV carriers reside in developing countries of the world. Chronic HBV-infected subjects are prone to develop chronic hepatitis and its complications, such as liver cirrhosis and liver cancer. In most of the developing countries, the main cause of liver cancer is HBV. Although the HBV infection has been effectively controlled in most developed countries of the world but this has not been reflected in developing countries. There are many factors for these discrepancies. It seems that the recommendations provided by developed and rich countries are not applicable in the context of socioeconomic aspects of developing countries of the world. In addition, some of the recommendations may be counter-productive for control of the HBV infection in developing countries. In fact, incomplete treatment of chronic HBV-infected subjects of developing countries and lack of proper follow-up system would become a formidable problem for mankind in future. Another problem to control the HBV in developing countries lies in the fact that the medical curricula of developing countries do not provide adequate importance about HBV infection. In addition, new information about various aspects of the HBV are rarely updated and communicated to physicians in these countries.