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Transmission of hepatitis B virus results from exposure to infectious blood or body fluids containing blood. HBV is 50 to 100 times more infectious than human immunodeficiency virus (HIV). [32] HBV can be transmitted through several routes of infection.
The spread of hepatitis B virus occurs most often through vertical transmission from mother to child during birth and delivery. HBV can also be spread through contact with blood or other bodily fluids during sexual intercourse with an infected partner.
The blood borne viruses (B, C) can cause both acute and chronic liver disease and can be transmitted from mother to child during birth, through contact with body fluids during sex, unsafe injections and through unscreened blood transfusions. [5] The most common types of hepatitis can be prevented or treated. [6]
One of the most common routes of infection globally is from women to their babies during birth. Since the late 1990s, all pregnant women in England have been offered an antenatal blood test for hep B.
Hepatitis B is also considered a sexually transmitted infection because it can be spread through sexual contact. [113] The highest rates are found in Asia and Africa and lower rates are in the Americas and Europe. [114] Approximately two billion people worldwide have been infected with the hepatitis B virus. [115]
The hepatitis D virus requires that a person first be infected with hepatitis B virus, so prevention efforts should focus on limiting the spread of hepatitis B. In people who have chronic hepatitis B infection and are at risk for superinfection with the hepatitis D virus, the preventive strategies are the same as for hepatitis B. [97]
HBV is the most common one among those hepatitis viruses. It can cause chronic infection of liver in humans, which has become a global public health problem, since chronic hepatitis can cause cirrhosis or death from liver failure within certain times. And it is the major cause of HCC, contributing about 60-80% of the HCC cases around the world.
Hepatitis B may also be classified as a vertically transmitted infection. The hepatitis B virus is large and does not cross the placenta. Hence, it cannot infect the fetus unless breaks in the maternal-fetal barrier have occurred, but such breaks can occur in bleeding during childbirth or amniocentesis. [13]