A new study has revealed the striking effectiveness of Alaska’s hepatitis B vaccination program.
According to the study, released Wednesday by the Alaska Section of Epidemiology, Alaska’s hepatitis B infection rate declined from 22.7 per 100,000 people in 1986 to just 0.4 cases per 100,000 people in 2015.
That decline mirrors the nationwide trend, previously reported by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Hepatitis B is a viral liver infection spread through birth from an infected mother, sex with an infected partner, sharing needles, or contacting the blood of an infected person.
According to the CDC, symptoms include fever, fatigue, jaundice, joint pain and dark urine, but many of those who are infected show no outside symptoms until the disease becomes chronic.
As many as one-quarter of chronic hepatitis B victims develop liver damage or liver cancer.
In the mid-1980s, hepatitis B infections were a significant problem in Alaska and the nation overall. In 1986, the peak of Alaska’s outbreak, the CDC estimated that 283,000 people were newly infected that year alone. Alaska had more than 100 cases, according to demographic and epidemiological data.
In 1991, the state began recommending every infant born in the state be vaccinated against hepatitis B at birth. The state began supplying vaccine to all newborns and infants starting in 1993, following in the path of the Alaska Native Tribal Health Consortium, which began offering it in 1984.
In 2001, the state began requiring the hepatitis B vaccine for all children attending public schools.
As a result of these measures, the infection rate dropped to almost nothing, particularly among the very young.
Today, the number of chronic hepatitis B patients in Alaska can be counted with two hands. Since 2011, there hasn’t been a single reported case in someone younger than 30 years old.
The vaccine is still administered with children getting three shots between birth and 6 months old to ward off the disease.
