Hepatitis C, SARS

Hepatitis C

The World Health Organization estimates that about 3% of the world’s population has been infected with HCV and that there are more than 170 million chronic carriers who are at risk of developing liver cirrhosis and/or liver cancer with a mortality rate of about 6%. In 1998, the estimated annual costs of acute and chronic hepatitis C (medical and work loss) was above US$ 1 billion in the USA

SARS

On 12 March 2003, the World Health Organization issued a global alert of an emerging infectious disease characterized by fever and atypical pneumonia. The rapid spread of severe acute respiratory syndrome – or SARS – worldwide resulted in 8439 cases and 809 deaths in 25 countries.  Although SARS is currently not a big problem, there is concern about MERS (Middle East Respiratory Syndrome), a virus which though it is less contagious than SARS, is thought to be more deadly.