The 7th Canadian Symposium on Hepatitis C Virus: "Toward Elimination of HCV: How to Get There"

Michael L Cheng; Mohamed S Abdel-Hakeem; Sophie E Cousineau; Jason Grebely; Alison D Marshall; Sahar Saeed; Selena M Sagan; Naglaa H Shoukry; Jordan J Feld; Sonya A MacParland

doi:10.3138/canlivj.2018-0018

The 7th Canadian Symposium on Hepatitis C Virus: "Toward Elimination of HCV: How to Get There"

Can Liver J. 2018 Oct 3;1(3):139-152. doi: 10.3138/canlivj.2018-0018. eCollection 2018 Summer.

Authors

Michael L Cheng^{1

2}, Mohamed S Abdel-Hakeem^{3

4}, Sophie E Cousineau⁵, Jason Grebely⁶, Alison D Marshall⁶, Sahar Saeed⁷, Selena M Sagan^{5

8}, Naglaa H Shoukry⁹, Jordan J Feld¹⁰, Sonya A MacParland^{1

2}

Affiliations

¹ Multi-Organ Transplant Program, University Health Network, Toronto, Ontario.
² Department of Laboratory Medicine and Pathobiology, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario.
³ Penn Institute for Immunology, Department of Microbiology, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
⁴ Department of Microbiology and Immunology, Faculty of Pharmacy, Cairo University, Cairo, Egypt.
⁵ Department of Microbiology and Immunology, McGill University, Montreal, Quebec.
⁶ Kirby Institute, University of New South Wales, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.
⁷ Department of Epidemiology, Biostatistics and Occupational Health, McGill University, Montreal, Quebec.
⁸ Department of Biochemistry, McGill University, Montreal, Quebec.
⁹ Centre de Recherche du Centre hospitalier de l'Université de Montréal, Montreal, Quebec.
¹⁰ Toronto Centre for Liver Disease, Toronto General Hospital, Toronto, Ontario.

Abstract

Hepatitis C virus (HCV) affects more than 268,000 people in Canada. Both the Canadian Institutes of Health Research and the Public Health Agency of Canada recognize the significant impact of HCV-related liver diseases and supported the establishment of a national hepatitis C research network, the Canadian Network on Hepatitis C (CanHepC). Interferon-free direct-acting antiviral regimens lead to more than 95% cure rates in almost all patients with well-tolerated short-course therapy. However, the goal of eliminating HCV in Canada cannot be fully realized until we overcome the financial, geographical, cultural, and social barriers that affect the entire continuum of care from diagnosis and linkage to care through treatment and prevention of new and reinfections. Current practices face difficulties in reversing HCV-induced immunological defects, expanding treatment to neglected communities, combating reinfections and co-infections, and expediting and simplifying the processes of diagnosis and treatment. As part of its knowledge translation mandate, CanHepC has organized the annual Canadian symposium on hepatitis C since 2012. The theme of this year's symposium, "Toward Elimination of HCV: How to Get There?" focused on identifying the requirements of our therapeutic strategies and health policies for the elimination of HCV in Canada.

Keywords: CanHepC; NCRTP-HepC; behavioural; biomedical; clinical; epidemiological; hepatitis C virus; public health; social sciences; viral hepatitis.

Grants and funding

CanHepC is funded by a joint initiative of the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR; NHC-142832), a network grant from CIHR (Grant Number NHC-142832), and the Public Health Agency of Canada (PHAC). In addition, CanHepC has received funding for the training program from Abbvie, Gilead, and Merck.