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Date Posted: Sat, March 03 2001, 19:11:04 PST
www.hcop.org
copied from: http://www.internationalmedicalnews.com/
Body decor raises liver risk
Almost one per cent of young women may be infected with the liver virus, hepatitis C - many because of tattoos and ear-piercing, doctors in the UK have warned.
Women who have undergone surgery also face an increased risk of infection - as do injecting drug users.
Tests on pregnant women attending an urban ante-natal clinic found that 0.8 per cent carried the virus.
The tests were carried out on 5,000 women in the centre of London, UK. Two thirds of them did not know they were carrying the virus before being tested, doctors report in the journal Gut.
Researchers found that women with tattoos and pierced ears were more than twice as likely as drug users to be infected.
Women who have been under the surgeon's knife are probably at risk because of contaminated blood used for transfusions.
The researchers from St Mary's Hospital, London, called for a national screening programme against the disease - pointing out that new drug treatments can cure 40 per cent of cases.
During the research women agreed to be tested - and afterwards were asked whether they thought the test should be offered to all pregnant women. 90 per cent said it should.
The doctors said about a third of carriers of the virus would face severe liver damage and risk of cancer up to 30 years after infection.
Writing in the same journal Dr Willaim Rosenberg, a liver specialist at Southampton University, UK, claimed the findings could under-represent the level of infection.
"Such a high level of infection establishes hepatitis C as a major health care problem for the 21st century, and one that cannot, and will not, be ignored."
But Professor Geoffrey Dusheiko, of the Royal Free and University College School of Medicine, London, warned that the cost of treatment for the virus was very high - at 5,000 pounds sterling for a six month course.
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