www.hrjournal.net Opinion Open Access Waheed et al. Hepatoma Res 2018;4:45 DOI: 10.20517/2394-5079.2018.58 Hepatoma Research © The Author(s) 2018. Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ ), which permits unrestricted use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, for any purpose, even commercially, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. Elimination of hepatitis from Pakistan by 2030: is it possible? Yasir Waheed 1 , Masood Siddiq 2 1 Foundation University Medical College, Foundation University Islamabad, Islamabad 44000, Pakistan. 2 Jinnah Memorial Hospital, 2-Civil Lines, Rawalpindi 46000, Pakistan. Correspondence to: Dr. Yasir Waheed, Foundation University Medical College, Foundation University Islamabad, Islamabad 44000, Pakistan. E-mail: yasir_waheed_199@hotmail.com; Prof. Masood Siddiq, Jinnah Memorial Hospital, 2-Civil Lines, Rawalpindi 46000, Pakistan. E-mail: dr.masood.siddiq@gmail.com How to cite this article: Waheed Y, Siddiq M. Elimination of hepatitis from Pakistan by 2030: is it possible? Hepatoma Res 2018;4:45. http://dx.doi.org/10.20517/2394-5079.2018.58 Received: 14 May 2018 First Decision: 20 Jun 2018 Revised: 17 Jul 2018 Accepted: 30 Jul 2018 Published: 14 Aug 2018 Science Editor: Guang-Wen Cao Copy Editor: Jun-Yao Li Production Editor: Cai-Hong Wang Abstract Globally 71 million people are living with hepatitis C virus (HCV) out which 7.1 million (10%) are present in Pakistan. Genotype 3 is the most common HCV type in the country. World Health Organization is working with health authorities in different countries for effective control of HCV, to reduce its incidence by 90% and to reduce hepatitis related mortality by 65% by the year 2030. There are several challenges that hinder elimination of HCV from Pakistan including the lack of patient awareness about the causes and transmission of disease, lack of affordability for investigations and drug treatment and lack of experienced healthcare professionals. Other major contributors to achieve HCV elimination are lack of effective drugs and delayed regulatory approvals combined with compromised monitoring by health authorities and lack of robust epidemiological data. Efforts are needed to educate the public about the modes of transmission and prevention of HCV infection, and massively upscale screening along with treatment. There is a dire need to prevent more than 200,000 new infections that occur each year in Pakistan. Given the scale of the problem, it is very unlikely that the government alone can handle it. Keywords: Hepatitis C virus, global health sector strategy, hepatitis elimination, national hepatitis strategic framework, punjab hepatitis ordinance, hepatitis diagnosis, screening OPINION Viral hepatitis caused 1.4 million deaths in 2015, which is comparable with the annual deaths from tuberculosis and higher than the annual deaths from HIV [1] . Te hepatitis epidemic remained neglected for