Syrian Arab News Agency S A N A
Sao Paulo, SANA – With the participation of Syria, the World Hepatitis Summit kicked off on Wednesday in the Brazilian capital of Sao Paulo.
The three-day Summit will discuss various topics, including the mechanisms of eradicating the disease, standards of successful awareness campaigns, the role of society and civil and global initiatives in this field and how to deliver treatment to all countries, in addition to the development of methods of detection and reporting and preventive interventions and risk factors.
In a speech during the opening of the Summit, Health Minister Nizar Yazigi said that Syria is one of the countries with average prevalence of hepatitis “B” and low prevalence of hepatitis “C”, according to the classification of the WHO and a study conducted by the Ministry in 2014.
He pointed out that the Ministry adopted the policy of providing free treatment to all hepatitis patients nationwide by opening diagnostic and treatment centers in each province, following a unified working manual for the Ministry set up in accordance with the latest international guides and is being constantly updated.
The Summit is a large-scale, global biennial event to advance the viral hepatitis agenda. It is a joint initiative between the World Hepatitis Alliance (WHA), World Health Organization (WHO) and Brazilian government.
The theme of the World Hepatitis Summit 2017 is implementing the global health sector strategy on viral hepatitis towards the elimination of hepatitis as a public health threat.
The summit aims to encourage more countries to take decisive action to tackle hepatitis, which still causes more than 1.3 million deaths every year and affects more than 325 million people around the world.
M.al-Frieh/H. Said
