On Thursday, May 9, 2024, Action Hepatitis Canada joined CanHepC, CanHepB, the Canadian Liver Foundation, and the Canadian Association for the Study of the Liver to mark the 3rd annual
Canadian Viral Hepatitis Elimination Day in Ottawa.
#CanHepDay24 #HepCantWait
Thank you to our many members and allies who are helping amplify our call for the federal government, as well as each province and territory, to bring urgency to eliminating viral hepatitis as a public health threat in Canada by 2030.
FIVE FEDERAL ASKS
In 2016, Canada made an international commitment to eliminate viral hepatitis as a public health threat by 2030. While much of this work falls to the provinces and territories, there are five key things the federal government can do now.
1. Planning: Add targets to measure progress in eliminating viral hepatitis to the 2025-2030 STBBI Action Plan.
An updated federal STBBI Action Plan was launched in January 2024. The plan excludes targets to measure Canada’s progress and inform federally funded projects. Targets are integral to an elimination plan.
2. Testing: Update hepatitis C screening guidelines to be evidence-based, develop evidence-based screening guidelines for hepatitis B, and start offering free, voluntary STBBI testing and linkage to care for all immigrants and newcomers.
Canada's hepatitis C screening guidelines recommend only screening people with certain risk factors, despite all evidence that risk-based screening guidelines are ineffective at identifying chronic hepatitis C infections in time to avoid advanced liver disease or death. Canada does not have national hepatitis B screening guidelines at all, resulting in many people being diagnosed at the same time they receive their liver cancer diagnosis.
3. Testing-to-Treatment Link: Engage manufacturers of point-of-care testing technologies to bring these tests to Canada.
Hepatitis C is curable and hepatitis B is treatable. It takes several appointments to proceed from initial screening to starting treatment, in part because point-of-care confirmatory testing technology used in other parts of the world is not yet available in Canada.
4. Prevention: Update NACI guidelines to recommend universal birth-dose hepatitis B vaccination.
Hepatitis B is vaccine-preventable. Canada is out of step with the WHO’s recommendation that even regions with low incidence of hepatitis B provide universal birth dose vaccination. Five provinces still offer the first publicly-funded doses of hepatitis B vaccine in school-based programs for ages 9-12, which have a vaccination rate of ~70%, missing the 90% WHO target.
5. Data: Fund and increase efforts to collect updated hepatitis B and C prevalence estimates and population-specific cascades of care for all Canadian provinces and territories.
In order to measure our progress in viral hepatitis elimination, we need reliable, fulsome data about how many people are affected.
Download as a PDF.
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These graphics can be shared on social media with your own message and the hashtags #HepCantWait and #CanHepDay24.
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CanHepDay 2024
A delegation of AHC community members, physicians, and patients were in Ottawa for #CanHepDay24.
We started the day with representatives from Indigenous Services Canada and the Non-Insured Health Benefits formulary to discuss ways we can make sure people who have First Nations status do not get caught up in provincial/territorial barriers to accessing hepatitis C treatment. We have a number of follow-ups coming from the conversation to continue this work.
Canadian Liver Foundation President and CEO Jennifer Nebesky spoke about Can Hep Day on CTV Ottawa.
In our press conference, we highlighted our updated 5 federal asks for accelerating progress toward viral hepatitis elimination.
We met with MP Salma Zahid to share our new Immigration Health is Public Health Report, in her role as a member of the Standing Committee on Immigration and Citizenship (CIMM).
In the afternoon we met with several representatives from the Public Health Agency of Canada to discuss the new report and our recommendations for improving diagnosis and linkages to care for immigrants and newcomers through a lens of human rights and health equity. It was a productive conversation, hopefully the first of many.
The day also got a boost from the hundreds of postcards mailed in in the week leading up to #CanHepDay, highlighting priority policies of advocates across the country as captured at the Wall of Commitment at the Canadian Liver Meeting in Toronto in March.
We started the day with representatives from Indigenous Services Canada and the Non-Insured Health Benefits formulary to discuss ways we can make sure people who have First Nations status do not get caught up in provincial/territorial barriers to accessing hepatitis C treatment. We have a number of follow-ups coming from the conversation to continue this work.
Canadian Liver Foundation President and CEO Jennifer Nebesky spoke about Can Hep Day on CTV Ottawa.
In our press conference, we highlighted our updated 5 federal asks for accelerating progress toward viral hepatitis elimination.
We met with MP Salma Zahid to share our new Immigration Health is Public Health Report, in her role as a member of the Standing Committee on Immigration and Citizenship (CIMM).
In the afternoon we met with several representatives from the Public Health Agency of Canada to discuss the new report and our recommendations for improving diagnosis and linkages to care for immigrants and newcomers through a lens of human rights and health equity. It was a productive conversation, hopefully the first of many.
The day also got a boost from the hundreds of postcards mailed in in the week leading up to #CanHepDay, highlighting priority policies of advocates across the country as captured at the Wall of Commitment at the Canadian Liver Meeting in Toronto in March.
Press conference recording via cpac:
CanHepDay 2023
A delegation of AHC community members, physicians, patients, and a nurse were in Ottawa for #CanHepDay23.
MP Adam van Koeverden, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Health, and MP Elizabeth May, Leader of the Green Party of Canada were among the MPs that stopped in to our Parliamentary Breakfast, and Public Health Agency of Canada (PHAC) Vice President Don Sheppard and PHAC Executive Director of the Center for Communicable Diseases and Infection Control, Jill Norman. We also met MP Jagmeet Singh outside West Block following our press conference.
In the afternoon we went to the Health Canada offices for a roundtable consultation on the national STBBI Action Plan renewal currently underway. We shared a number of considerations to provide accountability for both hepatitis B and C elimination efforts.
MP Adam van Koeverden, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Health, and MP Elizabeth May, Leader of the Green Party of Canada were among the MPs that stopped in to our Parliamentary Breakfast, and Public Health Agency of Canada (PHAC) Vice President Don Sheppard and PHAC Executive Director of the Center for Communicable Diseases and Infection Control, Jill Norman. We also met MP Jagmeet Singh outside West Block following our press conference.
In the afternoon we went to the Health Canada offices for a roundtable consultation on the national STBBI Action Plan renewal currently underway. We shared a number of considerations to provide accountability for both hepatitis B and C elimination efforts.
Press conference recording via cpac:
Media coverage & #CanHepDay23 announcements:
- Viral hepatitis is a silent killer that Canada should confront - Op-Ed by ANDRÉ PICARD
- Progress toward viral hepatitis elimination in Canada: Holding governments accountable - CATIE Blog
- More testing needed to identify, treat British Columbians living with viral hepatitis: infectious diseases expert - CTV News Vancouver
- Steering Committee Created to Eliminate Hepatitis C in Newfoundland and Labrador
- Niagara Health hosting community event to raise awareness about hepatitis - Niagara Health
- Scotiabank donates $1.35M to the MUHC Foundation to create a Montreal without hepatitis C - Financial Post
- INHSU launches three new Canadian Connecting With Care videos on #CanHepDay
CanHepDay 2022
We made a number of good connections during the press conference, meetings, and Parliamentary Reception in Ottawa. Stay tuned in our newsletters for more details as we follow up on these in the coming weeks.