IN THIS ISSUE… - Barnsley Council Online

WORLD HEPATITISDAY 2012Charles Gore, our Chief Executive andthe President of the World HepatitisAlliance, reports back on eventsaround the world.2012 has almost certainly been the biggestWorld Hepatitis Day so far. We estimatethat patient groups or governments or bothtook part in just under a hundred countriesaround the world.GhanaWorld Hepatitis Day is as much aboutaction as about awareness and on July28th the World Health Organizationreleased its global hepatitis strategyunder the title Viral Hepatitis Prevention &Control: Framework for Global Action. Thisis intended to provide a framework foreffective regional and national strategiesto tackle hepatitis and both Croatia andBulgaria have just announced the start ofdevelopment of their national strategies.Because both hepatitis B and hepatitis Care so under-diagnosed globally, not just inthe UK, activities for World Hepatitis Dayoften focus on testing. This year therewere many such events, for example inBRADFORD SOUTHASIAN COMMUNITYRAISE AWARENESSKarmand Community Centre in Bradfordtook part in a Guinness World Recordattempt last month to help raise awarenessto Hepatitis C.The free event, which took place on SaturdayJuly 28th, was organised by the Trust to raiseawareness of hepatitis C in the South Asiancommunity as part of a global effort to attempta world record for the most people to carry outthe “see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil”actions. This attitude prevails across the worldand most people remain undiagnosed.Ghana and also in Hong Kong, where atleast two new free testing initiatives werelaunched, one mobile, the other a yearround service in a community centre in theWestern New Territories, probably HongKong’s most deprived area.Posters were widely used. In Bangladeshthey distributed over ten thousandAlliance/WHO posters with the ‘It’sHong KongCloser Than You Think’ message. In HongKong on the other hand, an NGO used acompletely different, action film-typeto come. Participants were very excitedand proud to take part in the event so thatthey could help make a statement, theycame from businesses, media, council, GPsurgeries and children and members of thelocal community from Huddersfield,Bradford and even Manchester to take part.The event was covered by ITV Yorkshire,local radio and newspapers.message ‘Knock Down Hepatitis B’featuring two local celebrities. Thesewere put up throughout the Hong KongMetro system.New ZealandIn New Zealand they used the backs ofbuses and an adaptation of one of theAlliance/WHO posters with the ‘see noevil, speak no evil, hear no evil’ theme.There were of course awareness eventsacross the world, often aimed at gettingcontinued page 4While Bradford and Huddersfield both havelarge Asian populations who are particularlyat risk of being infected with the virus, it isvital that everyone is aware of it regardlessof their ethnicity.There is a huge amount of stigmasurrounding hepatitis in the community.This needs to be tackled urgently to preventneedless deaths.Shabana Begum, South Asian Project Coordinatorfor The Hepatitis C Trust said “Theevent was a great success we had morethan thirty people from the Indian andPakistani community although it was in themiddle of Ramadan people made the effortParticipants at The Karmand Community Centre, Bradford3