In this episode, Bright and Anousha chat with Dr. John Tavis, a professor, and scientist at St. Louis University School of Medicine, about current drug candidates for #hepatitisB treatment and updates about the cure.

Click here ➡️ https://ow.ly/AWbL50Ppnu9

On behalf of the Canadian Hepatitis B Network (CanHepB) and the Canadian Association for the Study of the Liver (CASL), we are pleased to invite you to join us at the Inaugural Progress toward Hepatitis B Elimination Meeting in Canada, September 29^th-October 1st 2023.

This meeting will be a unique opportunity to exchange ideas, promote collaboration and foster knowledge translation among Canadian clinicians, laboratory providers, public health researchers, policymakers, and academic & community-based organizations with an interest in hepatitis B virus (HBV) and/or hepatitis Delta virus (HDV) coinfection.  Moreover, this inaugural meeting will support advocacy efforts in Canada to increase awareness, reduce stigma, and health care disparities, and improve the care of persons living with hepatitis B or hepatitis delta coinfection.

Despite the availability of an effective vaccine for over 4 decades, hepatitis B continues to impact over 300 million people globally and at least 250,000 Canadians. Hepatitis B is the major global cause of end-stage liver disease and liver cancer. Every 30 seconds someone dies from hepatitis B.  Current oral antiviral therapy reduces liver disease risk but cannot cure hepatitis B, thus requiring lifelong and often expensive treatment.

There is a global race to find a cure for hepatitis B.  While we await a cure, Canada needs to develop a nationally coordinated strategy to prevent hepatitis B, identify affected persons, and improve access to care and life-saving treatment.

For the first time, our program will bring together national and global leaders in hepatitis B to discuss how Canada can address this major public health threat.

Sincerely,

REGISTER NOW

A greater understanding of the hepatitis B virus (HBV)
replication cycle has led to novel antiviral targets, interfering
with nucleocapsid assembly and disassembly.
In its role as a viral structural protein, the core protein
(HBc) forms a capsid of 120 HBc dimers that packages
the viral genome. Assembly agonists favour formation
of aberrant capsids or morphologically normal capsids
devoid of genetic material1. A number of such ‘capsid
assembly modulators’ (CAMs) are in clinical development.
However, a lack of consistent nomenclature
for these drugs has generated confusion. Compounds
targeting HBc have been described as CAMs, core
protein allosteric modulators (CpAMs), core or capsid
inhibitors, core-targeting agents, and as subclasses
(with inconsistent use on what is class 1 or 2, CAM-A
(aberrant), CAM-E (empty) and CAM-N (normal))2.
As HBc-targeting compounds are undergoing clinical
trials, a consistent classification would improve clarity.
To address the need for a convention that appropriately
categorizes these molecules and provides clear,
precise language to document their development, the
HBV Forum and ICE-HBV jointly convened a working
group (Supplementary Box 1) to develop a standardized
nomenclature that accommodates mechanisms of action
(MOAs) whilst being simple, intuitive and accessible.

 Read more here.

The next video of our #HBVCureFAQs series is out!! See the video where Dr Katharina Bartsch & Laura Kaltenberg of CTC North, collaborating in TherVacB, answer “How safe are #clinicaltrials & what should patients expect?” here. 

The symposium, chaired by Mala Maini and Antonio Bertoletti, debated challenges surrounding immunotherapies for HBV and discussed ways forward.

The videos from this event are on ICE-HBV YouTube channel:

• Part 1.
• Part 2.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bgagkywNnjk

Welcome to the 3^rd HBV Community Workshop co-organised by The Hepatitis B Foundation and ICE-HBV in Paris on 22 September 2022.

Click here to watch the video. 

See the call to action from the community forum here.

The Forum is an annual public awareness event co-hosted by the Hepatitis B Foundation and ICE-HBV to provide a powerful conclusion to the International HBV Meeting.

Paris, Sept. 22, 2022 – The perspectives of the almost 300 million people living with hepatitis B is critical as scientists and clinicians continue working toward hepatitis B cure and elimination, which was the focus of a special session that concluded the 2022 International HBV Meeting.

The largest global meeting focused solely on the science of hepatitis B, the HBV Meeting was held this week (Sept. 18-22) in Paris. The Community Forum provided an opportunity for the researchers, physicians and others engaged with hepatitis B to understand the needs of the greater hepatitis B community. Just as important, it allowed those living with hepatitis B to learn about the disease and progress in treatment and a cure directly from the scientists who have made this their life’s work.

This year’s Community Forum focused on the European Union, where many hurdles exist in terms of health care inequality, leading to unequal access to hepatitis B screening and treatment, health disparities, stigma and lack of prioritization to eliminate hepatitis B.

Following Marinela Debu from ELPA, the European Liver Patients’ Association, organizers and partners “call for equitable access to care in the European Union, so that when the cure comes, it benefits everyone.”

The Community Forum was co-hosted by the Hepatitis B Foundation and the International Coalition to Eliminate HBV (ICE-HBV). Foundation President Chari A. Cohen, DrPH, MPH, said: “We truly believe in the concept of ‘nothing about us without us.’ Finding a functional cure for hepatitis B will only be beneficial if we address the structural challenges already faced by people living with hepatitis B.”

Fabien Zoulim, MD, PhD, chair of ICE-HBV said, “The forum has become an integral part of the annual international meeting. Inclusion of this audience is pivotal to the success of any progress, which is why the just concluded Community Forum is an essential part of the HBV meeting.”

Findings from this year’s Community Forum highlight that, while there is much progress being made towards finding therapies that could lead to functional cure for many people living with hepatitis B, there is still much work to be done to accomplish equitable care. Improved screening systems will be required to ensure an equitable access to cure.