The evidence for the need to test routinely is mounting.

 Well, in fact, it has been evident for a long time as I have accumulated the studies and stories regarding adolescents and written about it, and since presenting the information to the American Public Health Association in 2000: their desire to be tattooed and the statistical prevalence of high risk behavor, sexual and otherwise, among adolescents and young adults.

Sixteen and a half percent of young people between 12 and 17 drink alcohol.

Thirty seven percent of those 16-25 are tattooed. (Judy Woodruff on Colbert Report)

Studies have shown consistently high rates of anal sexual contact (it’s not really sex, right?) alcohol use and drug experimentation among children as young as 12.  Add to the evidence that these risky behaviors are  clearly linked to rates of hepatitis C infection and please tell me, CDC, why this is not a message included in your articles? Is it because the right and left hand are not communicating? What’s the deal here? We hear from the Kellogg Foundation, the Kaiser Foundation (http://www.kff.org/hivaids/index.cfm) and   many other organizations about risky behaviors, high risk groups, and rates of HIV, yet, the silence about hepatitis C is deafening. Why?

 Alcohol is toxic to the liver, Hepatitis C is contracted at a young age and often diagnosed 30 years or more later, after damage has been done by alcohol use and other factors. This information has easily been available for the last 14 years.

We have years and years of studies on this. We have years of studies on the cumulative effects of smoking on the liver. We have solid evidence that tattooing is, at least, highly suspect in transmissions. We do not yet know all risk factors. Yet, we STILL have no public health program to reach out to the youth, particularly minority youth, who are being infected at rates likely higher than anyone suspects. Why?

Our troop in Iraq are on treatment for hepatitis C after being diagnosed with strains found only in the middle east. Think about that, those of you familiar with being on treatment. Young soldiers in the field in Iraq are being treated with interferon and ribavirin as they patrol in their vehicles and on foot, interacting with the Iraqi people.

I have been asked to put together material for a public school event on February 2nd to reach 12,000 people. I am struggling to get it together as donations are severely down this year and I am not sure at this point that I will be able to meet the deadline.

 Please, put two and two together when you read news pieces like this one:

“WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Nearly half of all U.S. high-school students admit to recently drinking alcohol illegally, and most of them were binge drinkers, according to a government survey published on Tuesday.

These binge drinkers — who had five or more drinks in a row — were more likely to have sex, fight, smoke or use drugs, the study by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found.

“Our study clearly shows that it’s not just that students drink alcohol, but how much they drink that most strongly affects whether they experience other health and social problems,” said Dr. Jacqueline Miller of the CDC’s Alcohol Team, who led the study.

“It also underscores the importance of implementing effective strategies to prevent underage and binge drinking, such as enforcing the minimum legal drinking age and reducing alcohol marketing to youth, which can help us change social norms regarding the acceptability of underage and binge drinking.”

Across the United States, the minimum drinking age is 21, while most teens leave high school by age 17, 18 or 19.

Writing in the journal Pediatrics, the CDC team said they analyzed data from 15,214 high-school students (aged 14 to 18) who completed the 2003 Youth Risk Behavior Survey.

They found that 45 percent of the students admitted having drunk alcohol in the past month. Of these, 64 percent were binge-drinkers.

And the binge drinkers were not simply experimenting — 69 percent reported having done so more than once in the past 30 days.

Teen drinkers in general were more than twice as likely to be sexually active as non-drinkers, the researchers found.

They were more than four times as likely to smoke cigarettes and more than twice as likely to have been in a physical fight, the researchers found. These rates went up even higher for binge drinkers, they reported.

The binge drinkers were more than five times as likely as non-drinkers to be sexually active, more than 18 times as likely to smoke cigarettes, and more than four times as likely to have been in a physical fight. They were also far more likely to smoke marijuana and attempt suicide, the researchers said.

Drinkers also did more poorly in school, according to the survey.

Among other studies on teenage alcohol use, in September the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration found that 16.5 percent of 12- to 17-year-olds admitted to drinking. That study included students younger than high school age.

The 2006 Monitoring the Future survey, done by the University of Michigan and published in December, found that 75 percent of 12th graders, the oldest high school students, had tried alcohol. ”

Please put Hepatitis C education and awareness on your list of New Year’s Resolutions.

Silence is no longer an option.

 

Teresa Hanbey, Executive Director

Hepatitis C Outreach Project

7316 N. Mobile Avenue,

Portland OR 97217