HEPATITIS B: DIAGNOSIS, TREATMENT
Again, some blood tests will tell you:
• if you have ever been in contact with the bug, and have developed antibodies
• if you still have the infectious part of the virus, the ‘antigen’, floating around your blood stream, and are infectious to other people—a carrier
• if your liver has been damaged by the virus, if you are a carrier.
Again, there is a ‘window period’, as explained in the previous section on AIDS—HIV infection, so sometimes a repeat test may be necessary to exclude infection.
Treatment. Unfortunately, there is no effective cure. Being a virus, it doesn’t respond to antibiotics. The best we can do is try to stop it spreading, and give symptomatic relief to those who are in the ‘sick’ phase of the disease.
There are drug treatments being tried on people who have chronic hepatitis, with varying success. Ultimately some people will be treated for liver failure, as the chronic stage progresses, and they will sometimes be candidates for liver transplants.
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