A health advocate and Medical Laboratory Scientist, Ms Aisha Yusuf, has called on Nigeria and other West African countries to strengthen affordable hepatitis diagnostics, digital disease surveillance and laboratory systems to eliminate viral hepatitis as a public health threat by 2030.
Speaking on Tuesday to mark World Hepatitis Day 2026, Yusuf described weak diagnostic capacity and poor health data systems as the biggest obstacles to tackling viral hepatitis across the region.
According to her, more than 80 to 90 per cent of people living with viral hepatitis in West Africa are unaware of their status, making early treatment, disease control and prevention difficult.
“When we focus entirely on hepatitis treatment without fixing diagnostics, we are treating an invisible enemy,” she said.
The fundamental blind spot in West Africa is that over 80 to 90 per cent of people living with viral hepatitis do not know their status.
“Without accessible, low-cost screening at the primary healthcare level and unified digital registries to track positive cases, public health interventions end up reacting to late-stage liver complications rather than stopping transmission at the source.”
Yusuf explained that the concentration of hepatitis testing services in tertiary hospitals has created major barriers for millions of Nigerians, especially those living in rural and underserved communities.
She noted that confirmatory viral load testing and Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) services remain largely unavailable at primary and secondary healthcare facilities, forcing many patients to travel long distances or bear unaffordable costs before receiving a diagnosis.
She warned that delayed diagnosis often results in patients seeking medical attention only after developing severe liver disease.
Limited testing turns viral hepatitis into a silent epidemic. Because baseline screening and confirmatory viral load testing are heavily concentrated in tertiary urban centres, rural and semi-urban populations face immense geographical and financial barriers.
“When out-of-pocket diagnostic costs rival a family’s monthly income, patients delay testing until severe symptoms present, at which point clinical management becomes exponentially more expensive and far less effective,” she said.
The health advocate also identified major weaknesses in hepatitis surveillance and disease reporting systems across West Africa, blaming the continued reliance on paper-based laboratory records and fragmented reporting channels.
She urged governments to integrate hepatitis screening into existing electronic disease surveillance platforms and mandate both public and private laboratories to submit real-time reports to national health databases.
The biggest gap in surveillance is a reliance on paper-based laboratory registers that create data silos.
Laboratory records rarely interface with national public health databases in real time.
“Governments must integrate hepatitis screening into existing digital surveillance platforms and mandate real-time electronic reporting from both private and public laboratories to build an accurate national disease registry,” she said.
Yusuf further advocated the adoption of digital technologies to modernise laboratory services and improve patient follow-up.
According to her, mobile-based diagnostic reporting, automated text message notifications and cloud-based laboratory information systems can reduce delays in delivering test results while preventing patients from being lost after initial screening.
She also called for the decentralisation of molecular diagnostic services by leveraging existing multi-disease point-of-care testing platforms at primary healthcare centres.
Digital tools bridge the critical gap between screening and retention in care.
“Decentralising molecular diagnostics through existing multi-disease testing platforms can significantly improve turnaround time and linkage to treatment,” she said.
Yusuf stressed that achieving the World Health Organisation’s target of eliminating viral hepatitis by 2030 would require greater involvement of young healthcare professionals, researchers and innovators.
She said young professionals possess the digital expertise, innovative thinking and grassroots connections needed to expand awareness campaigns, strengthen disease surveillance and improve community-level screening.
Young health professionals and innovators are the execution engine for the 2030 elimination target.
We bring two distinct advantages: fluency in digital tools and proximity to frontline grassroots realities.
Early-career practitioners are already driving micro-elimination campaigns, leveraging health technology for community-level screening and demystifying diagnostic data.
“When young professionals are given seats at policy design tables, advocacy moves from passive awareness campaigns to measurable, technology-enabled implementation,” she said.
Yusuf urged African governments to view investments in affordable diagnostics, laboratory infrastructure and digital health systems as long-term investments in health security capable of reducing healthcare costs and preventing avoidable deaths.
“Elimination is impossible without diagnostic equity. Investing in affordable diagnostic kits, decentralised laboratory networks and health data tracking is not merely an operational expense; it is a cost-saving health security investment,” she said.
She also encouraged Nigerians to take advantage of available hepatitis screening services, stressing that early diagnosis remains the most effective defence against severe liver disease.
“Hepatitis is preventable and manageable, but early testing is your strongest defence. Know your status today because early detection saves lives,” she said.
According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), hepatitis is an inflammation of the liver caused by viral infections, alcohol consumption and certain medications.
The global health body warns that viral hepatitis is becoming a major public health threat in Africa, where deaths from the disease could surpass those caused by HIV/AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis if urgent action is not taken.
WHO estimates that more than 70 million people in Africa are living with chronic viral hepatitis, with at least 200,000 deaths recorded annually.
The organisation noted that hepatitis B and C account for the highest burden of illness and deaths. While hepatitis B is preventable through vaccination and manageable with treatment, hepatitis C is curable with appropriate medication.
WHO added that expanding access to early diagnosis, treatment, vaccination, stronger surveillance systems and public awareness would be crucial to eliminating viral hepatitis as a public health threat by 2030.
source:NAN
