Facts About Hepatitis A and C: CDC-OC

Facts About Hepatitis A and C

July 4, 1997

Hepatitis A

• Symptoms include jaundice, fatigue, abdominal pain, loss of appetite, intermittent nausea, and diarrhea
• Estimated 125,00­200,000 total infections/yearly in United States; 84,000­134,000 symptomatic infections/yearly; 100 deaths annually; 33% of Americans have evidence of past infection (immunity)
• Illness can be prolonged or relapsing (15%), but there is no chronic infection
• The estimated cost for treating hepatitis A is $200 million (1991)/yearly including medical and work loss
• Hepatitis A is transmitted by fecal-oral; food/waterborne outbreaks; or bloodborne (rare)
• Persons at-risk for infection include household/sexual contacts of infected persons; international travelers; persons living on American Indian reservations, Alaska Native villages, and other regions with endemic hepatitis A
• During outbreaks: day care center employees or attendees, homosexually active men, injecting drug users
• Hepatitis A vaccine is highly effective in preventing the disease.

Hepatitis C

• Symptoms include jaundice, fatigue, abdominal pain, loss of appetite, intermittent nausea, and vomiting
• Estimated 35,000­180,000 total infections/yearly in United States; 3,000­54,000 (30%) symptomatic infections/yearly; 8,000­10,000 deaths annually
• More than 85 percent of infected persons will develop chronic infection (3.9 million Americans); 24,500­
• 126,000 will develop chronic liver disease (70%)/yearly
• The estimated cost for treating hepatitis C is $600 million (199)/yearly including medical and work loss
• Hepatitis C is transmitted by blood, sexual contact, and from mother-to-infant
• Persons at-risk for infection include injecting drug users, health-care workers, hemodialysis patients, persons living at a low socioeconomic level, sexual/household contacts of infected persons, sexually active heterosexuals, and transfusion recipients
• There is no vaccine for hepatitis C.

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