Canada: Psychosis, Hepatitis C linked to high death rate in Downtown Eastside: UBC

The mortality rate in the Downtown Eastside is eight times the national average, according to a new UBC study that followed 371 people for about four years. 

 

The death rate in the Downtown Eastside is eight times higher than the Canadian average, and treatable problems are linked to mortality, according to research from the University of British Columbia published last month.

Psychosis and liver problems related to hepatitis C were the highest risk factors for mortality, according to the study of 371 people over about four years.

Researchers recruited the participants from single-room occupancy hotels and the Downtown Community Court. Thirty-one of them died.

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Canada: Sydney advocate praises N.S. coverage of hep C drugs

SYDNEY — A Cape Breton health-care advocate is welcoming the province’s decision to cover a new line of hepatitis C drugs.

Christine Porter, who runs the Ally Centre of Cape Breton in Sydney, said any move to lower prescription drug costs for the marginalized is a step in the right direction.

She said the island is home to the highest per capita rates of the disease in both the province and the country.

“It’s a great thing when the government covers medications for any disease, especially with hepatitis C; the cost is exorbitant unless you have a really, really good medical plan,” said Porter.

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Canada: Diane Parsons, who fought for hepatitis C victims, dead at 64

Diane Forsyth, better known under maiden name, Diane Parsons, famed for leading legal fight for those infected with hepatitis C from tainted blood transfusions.

 

HALIFAX — A Halifax woman who led a $1.18 billion class-action settlement for those infected with hepatitis C died Saturday at the age of 64.

Diane Forsyth became known nationally under her maiden name, Diane Parsons, for leading the legal fight for those infected with hepatitis C from blood transfusions.

Her family doctor, Patricia Beresford, said Forsyth, who had a bleeding disorder, became ill after getting a blood transfusion before dental surgery in 1989.

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Canada: Warning to all baby boomers: get tested for Hep C

A Saskatoon nurse predicts a surge of liver disease among baby boomers due to undiagnosed Hepatitis C.

“We’re going to see this huge wave of patients with end stage liver disease that are going to be dying from, potentially, liver cancer, kidney failure due to issues with their liver, and this is now the beginning,” said Lesley Gallagher, a Hepatitis C treatment support nurse with the Saskatoon Infectious Disease Care Network in Riversdale.

“We’re seeing it now, and we’re going to keep on seeing it.”

The number of Canadians with advanced liver disease is increasing, according to a 2014 study published in the Canadian Journal of Gastroenterology and Hepatology. More than 20 per cent of those who are infected with Hepatitis C will have significant complications from their disease by 2035, the study found.

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Canada: 'Get informed, get tested': getting the word out about hepatitis C

Steve Pollard came close to death, underwent two liver transplants, and received treatment with experimental drugs before he was clear of hepatitis C and began to get his life back. When he recovered, he vowed he would devote his life to raising awareness about the viral disease — known as the “silent killer” — with the hope of preventing others from going through what he did.

Pollard, 48, was one of the speakers at an event outside Ottawa City Hall on Tuesday to mark World Hepatitis Day.

His message: “Get informed, get tested and tell a friend or loved one to do the same. If you are not doing it for yourself, do it for them.”

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Canada: BC Transit Campaign to Raise Awareness about HCV Testing

In honor of World Hepatitis Day (July 28th), HepCBC Hepatitis C Education and Prevention Society has launched a month long campaign in seven cities across British Columbia, including Vancouver, Victoria, Richmond, Surrey, Kelowna, Nanaimo, and Prince George.

The goal of this campaign is to increase awareness about hepatitis C testing in British Columbia.

An estimated 80,000 people in British Columbia are infected with hepatitis C. Of those infected, 75 per cent are baby boomers (people born between 1945 and 1975). In addition, an estimated 44 per cent of those infected do not know they are infected.

- See more at: http://smartsexresource.com/health-providers/blog/201507/bc-transit-campaign-to-raise-awareness-about-hcv-testing#sthash.44Y7fG9w.dpuf

Canada: Retired nurse from Halton was shocked when she was diagnosed with Hep C

Halton residents asked to recognize World Hepatitis Day by tweeting

 

She spent most of her adult life working as an emergency room nurse and was looking forward to a less stressful retirement.

So the Halton resident never imagined a routine check-up with her family doctor would reveal she had contracted Hepatitis C.

“It came as a complete shock,” said the married woman with three adult sons. “I didn’t have any inkling I had this disease.

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Canada: Leading Canadian researcher calls for inclusion of co-infected people in large HCV clinical trials

Hepatitis C virus (HCV) infects the liver. Chronic infection with HCV causes inflammation in this vital organ and slowly degrades it as healthy tissue is replaced with scar tissue. This ongoing injury to the liver results in complications, including bacterial infections, internal bleeding and liver, kidney and brain dysfunction. If left untreated, HCV infection can cause severe liver injury, the liver can stop working and death can occur. HCV infection also increases the risk for developing liver cancer.

Impact of HIV co-infection
Co-infection with HCV and HIV is relatively common, as both viruses have shared routes of infection. HIV-HCV co-infection accelerates the pace of HCV-related liver injury.

Historically, co-infected people have had increased rates of illness and death compared to people with HCV infection alone (mono-infection). There are at least two reasons for this, as follows:

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Canada: Ontario approves second costly drug for hepatitis C

With provincial approval of a second costly drug that can cure hepatitis C, Ottawa liver specialist Dr. Curtis Cooper is now expecting to see thousands of his patients cured of the disease that, without treatment, had the potential to destroy their lives.

The Ontario government agreed this week to pay for the drug Holkira Pak which, pharmaceutical company AbbVie says had a 97 per cent cure rate in genotype 1 hepatitis C patients during clinical trials. It is the second hepatitis C drug the province has approved this year under the Ontario Drug Benefit exceptional access program. Earlier,the province agreed to pay for the drug Harvoni, which has a similar high cure rate for hepatitis C.

Both drugs cost in the $50,000 to $60,000 range, or more, which, until the province approved them, meant they were out of reach to most patients. Unlike previous treatments for hepatitis C, the drugs are easy to take in daily pill form, are well tolerated by patients and cure the disease in the vast majority of cases.

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Canada: Ontario urged to provide better access to breakthrough hepatitis C drugs

People infected with potentially fatal hepatitis C from tainted blood are pushing Ontario to make them whole by paying for expensive breakthrough drugs considered a virtual cure for the liver disease.

Ontario’s health ministry says 341 Ontarians with stage-two liver disease or worse get Sovaldi or Harvoni pills funded by taxpayers — $60,000 for a 12-week course — under an exceptional access program.

The medications are light-years ahead of previous pharmaceuticals that had troubling side effects and did not work nearly as well.

Doctors say the triage system, in which a FibroScan (a non-invasive liver test) must meet or exceed a specific level of liver damage, can miss patients with complications that would otherwise make them eligible for taxpayer coverage.

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Canada: Hep C at colonoscopy clinic: Taking measures to prevent a second outbreak

On Dec. 24, 2013, four patients at a Kitchener colonoscopy clinic became infected with hepatitis C.

It was several months before any of them realized it – and nearly a year before a second diagnosis allowed public health officials to link the cases to Tri-City Colonoscopy Clinic.

While nobody knows what happened to transmit the virus with complete certainty, it’s believed shared equipment is to blame.

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Canada: Baby Boomer HCV Testing Advocated by BC Legislators in a Big Way!

Victoria, BC, May 25, 2015. From across the aisle and across the province, 16 British Columbia MLAs and 5 staff volunteered to “roll up their sleeves” to get tested for hepatitis C in hopes they can help broaden, normalize and de-stigmatize use of this test. After hearing that 75% of the people with hepatitis C in Canada are in the age cohort born 1945 – 1965, and 44% of the people who have Hep C don’t know it, they decided to show leadership (and courage – who likes needles?) – by getting this simple blood test publicly. The two nurses from Victoria Cool Aid Society and volunteers from HepCBC Hepatitis C Education & Prevention Society said they were surprised at the strong response, and had to turn away three MLAs (Stephanie Cadieux from the government, plus Bill Routley and John Horgan) when they ran out of needles!

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Canada: Personal-care worker struggles after contracting hepatitis C from client

The journey from the good life to bad started in the summer of 2011. Then, nearly 20 years into a career as a personal-care worker, Rowe took a client into her home for weekend care.

The non-communicative client cut herself in the bathroom and while a visiting nurse friend stemmed the bleeding, Rowe began to clean up.

“It’s summer, I’m in flip-flops and I’ve got cracked feet. I’ve got my gloves on, but they aren’t going to do anything for me.”

The client had hepatitis C and an unknowing Rowe contracted the disease.

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Canada: Contaminated vial likely cause of hepatitis C outbreak: report

KITCHENER — Region of Waterloo Public Health concluded its investigation into a hepatitis C outbreak at a Kitchener colonoscopy clinic in late 2013.

The final report presented to a regional council committee Tuesday said what most likely happened is hepatitis C was spread from a previously undiagnosed client to four other patients at Tri-City Colonoscopy Clinic on Dec. 24, 2013, when a bottle of medication was contaminated.

"There was a lapse in infection control related to the use of multi-dose vials," said regional medical officer of health Dr. Liana Nolan. 

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Canada: Williams Lake gets Hepatitis C clinic

Waiting times for people in the Cariboo seeking treatment to cure Hepatitis C will be shorter now that a new clinic has opened in Williams Lake.

Every month Dr. Alexandra King and clinical research nurse Shawn Sharma will run the clinic for a few days out of the Atwood Clinic in co-operation with local family doctor Jolien Steyl, who already runs an HIV-Aids clinic.

“As a family doctor it’s been a nightmare getting patients treated,” Steyl said. “They either have to travel really far or they don’t get started on treatment because the waiting lists are long.”

King and Sharma work at the Vancouver Infectious Diseases Centre (VIDC) where King  is an internal medicine specialist.

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Canada: MP Health Critic Murray Rankin Gets Tested for Hepatitis C

Today in Victoria, BC, Official Opposition Health Critic MP @Murray Rankin showed his support for Baby Boomer testing of hepatitis C by “rolling up his sleeve” for the simple blood test. HepCBC was there to record this special occasion. We applaud this kind of “hands-on” action which shows leadership on the important health issue of un-diagnosed hepatitis C.

Just before he took the test, Mr. Rankin said, “I think it’s important that hepatitis C testing be done without any stigma…I’m here to say as a Member of Parliament it is something that everybody should do. It is something that is a wonderful health initiative and I’m pleased to be doing it as well.”

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Canada: Province covers cost of new hepatitis C drugs

The Saskatchewan government says it will now provide new drug coverage for hepatitis C -- a viral disease that affects the liver.

Health Minister Dustin Duncan says the new drugs, Harvoni and Sovaldi, are better tolerated by patients than other therapies.

The drugs are said to cure 90 to 98 per cent of patients in as little as eight to 12 weeks.

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Canada: Ontario decision to cover costly hepatitis C drug a lifesaver, doctor says

Ottawa liver specialist Dr. Curtis Cooper is calling Ontario’s decision to pay for new treatments that can cure hepatitis C a “landmark event” that will change the lives of thousands of people with the disease.

Cooper, director of The Ottawa Hospital and Regional Hepatitis Program, sees thousands of hepatitis C patients, many of whom will benefit from the new drug therapy now that it is covered by the province.

“This is going to mean the difference between health or illness and death,” for many patients, he said.

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AIDS Specialist Advocates Sweeping Approach to Battle Against Hepatitis C

Could hepatitis C be the next communicable disease to come under a targeted attack in B.C.?

It will be if HIV/AIDS expert Dr. Julio Montaner has his way.

Montaner said Tuesday that even if the virus is eradicated among baby boomers, that won’t stop its continued spread.

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Canada: Multiple Provinces Align to Provide Public Funding for Harvoni™, the First Single Tablet Regimen for the Treatment of Genotype 1 Chronic Hepatitis C Virus Infection

-- Reimbursement of Harvoni Within Five Months of Health Canada Notice of Compliance Brings Patients Earlier Opportunity for a Cure --

MISSISSAUGA, Ontario, Mar 24, 2015 (BUSINESS WIRE) -- Gilead Sciences Canada, Inc. (Gilead Canada) today announced that multiple provinces will provide public access to Harvoni™ (ledipasvir/sofosbuvir), the first once-daily, single tablet regimen for the treatment of chronic hepatitis C virus (HCV) genotype 1 infection in adults. In Canada, it is estimated that more than 250,000 Canadians are living with chronic HCV infection, with thousands of new cases diagnosed each year.1 Genotype 1 infection represents an estimated 65 per cent of patient cases.2

Public reimbursement comes after a positive recommendation from the Common Drug Review, and as a result of a productive collaboration between Gilead Canada and the Pan-Canadian Pharmaceutical Alliance (pCPA) to ensure participating provinces are able to provide timely access to patients in need of curative treatment. This review, co-led by the BC Ministry of Health and the Ontario Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care, resulted in an agreement with member provinces to fund the innovative therapy for patients.

“We have been waiting for an innovative therapy like Harvoni since interferon was first used to treat the disease,” said Dr. Alnoor Ramji, Clinical Associate Professor of Medicine (Gastroenterology and Hepatology), University of British Columbia. “This is a transformative, interferon-free therapy, with a combination of high cure rates, good tolerability and simplicity of treatment. Harvoni provides patients with the confidence to commit to therapy and a very high probability to achieve a cure.”

Current treatments include interferon and ribavirin that often exclude patients from treatment or lead to early discontinuation of treatment due to associated side effects. Harvoni represents a significant advance in the treatment of genotype 1 HCV infection, the most prevalent genotype in Canada. Harvoni is the only once-daily, single tablet regimen that offers cure rates between 94 and 99 per cent, eliminates the need for interferon and ribavirin, and shortens the duration of treatment to as little as eight weeks for many patients. Eight weeks of treatment with Harvoni can be considered for treatment-naïve patients without cirrhosis who have baseline HCV viral load below 6 million IU/mL. Recently, the Canadian Association for the Study of the Liver updated the Canadian consensus guidelines on the management of hepatitis C and recommended Harvoni as first-line therapy for all genotype 1 patients.

“Today’s announcement recognizes the significant health-system and societal benefits associated with curing this disease and preventing its complications,” said Dr. Paul Marotta, Associate Professor, University of Western Ontario and with London Health Sciences Centre. “Access to Harvoni will help us confront this serious public health issue and start formulating longer-term solutions that may prove relevant to the hepatitis C disease elimination efforts across Canada.”

In a recent article, “Burden of disease and cost of chronic hepatitis C virus infection in Canada,” (Canadian Journal of Gastroenterology and Hepatology), leading Canadian hepatitis C specialists highlighted an expected 205 per cent increase in cases of liver cancer, a 160 per cent increase in liver-related deaths, and a 60 per cent increase in total healthcare costs over the next 20 years.2 Recently, the article was recognized with a scientific award for its groundbreaking research in Canada.
In addition to Harvoni, Gilead Canada’s Sovaldi® (sofosbuvir) has also been listed for public reimbursement for chronic HCV genotypes 1, 2 and 3 infection in multiple provinces.

“We live in an era of rapid evolution in the treatment of chronic hepatitis C infection, and Gilead Canada is pleased that our collaboration with the pCPA has allowed multiple provinces to recognize the clinical value of Harvoni as a simple, well tolerated and curative therapy for patients living with genotype 1 HCV,” said Edward Gudaitis, General Manager, Gilead Sciences Canada, Inc. “Gilead Canada will continue to work closely with all provinces and territories to bring this cost-effective, once-daily treatment to patients across Canada.”

Read complete press release here