Urging Hep B death on U.K babies

Hepatitis B Vaccine Urged For British Babies

By Sarah Boseley
The Guardian - UK
11-5-4


Another vaccination should be added to the list of jabs given to every child in Britain, to protect against the liver disease hepatitis B, doctors argued yesterday.

The suggestion may be controversial, because the disease is most prevalent among intravenous drug users, gay men and prisoners, but the doctors writing in today's British Medical Journal point out that 150 countries now immunise their populations and Britain is therefore an exception to the norm.

Hepatitis B is a virus passed in the blood which causes liver inflammation, cirrhosis and cancer of the liver. "The magnitude and clinical consequences of chronic hepatitis B make a strong case for its prevention and treatment," say Rakesh Aggarwal and colleagues of the Sanjay Gandhi Postgraduate Institute of Medical Sciences in Lucknow, India.

Britain is one of the few developed countries not to implement universal immunisation of babies, they write. "Because the burden of hepatitis B was low and individual rights were considered paramount, a policy of selective immunisation of newborns of carrier mothers and in high-risk groups has been followed. This policy fails to identify a large proportion of those at risk."

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