Over 60% of Romanians have never been tested for hepatitis B or C., and more than 80% have never had an HIV test, reveals the study “Knowledge, attitudes and practices of the general population regarding HIV / AIDS and hepatitis B and C”, carried out by the National Institute of Infectious Diseases “Prof. Dr. Matei Balș” and published on Thursday.
According to the study, only 17.7% of Romanians underwent an HIV screening.
“Regarding the level of knowledge and attitudes of Romanians towards the three viruses (HepB, HepC and HIV), there are still a large number of people who do not correctly identify the ways of transmitting these diseases, do not have a perception and the fact that more than 80% of Romanians have never been tested for HIV shows that the general public is at risk of developing their own risk of becoming ill and tends to adopt inappropriate attitudes towards people infected with B / C or HIV. does not realize the importance of prevention in the case of asymptomatic diseases “, said Prof. Dr. Adrian Streinu-Cercel, on the occasion of the presentation of the study.
In an interview with RFI, the doctor points out that “anyone who has a risk behavior must be tested. This type of behavior is represented, for example, by belonging to a certain group, such as men who have sex with men, those who are in the field of prostitution, those who are users of drugs with intravenous administration, heterosexual people who have unprotected sex. with several partners ”.
The main danger, in the context of these alarming statistics, says the manager of the National Institute of Infectious Diseases “Prof. Dr. Matei Balş”, is the creation of groups of patients who are potentially involved and who pass on (no virus). All these viruses have the same transmission routes: unprotected sexual intercourse, blood and sharing of manicure, pedicure, etc. instruments ”.
Prof. Dr. Adrian Streinu-Cercel also says that if we know that we have been exposed to these risk factors, we must pay attention to the possible symptoms and go and test ourselves: “with regard to the HIV virus, when the body first comes into contact with this virus it develops a sindrom pseudo-gripal which lasts about two weeks. At the same time, lymph nodes appear on either side of the neck. Regarding hepatitis B and C viruses, about 20-30% of patients present jaundice, that yellowing of the eyes. The rest, however, are subclinical forms of the disease that go unnoticed. Only after decades, the patient can discover that he has an evolutionary form of the disease, which is AIDS or chronic hepatitis ”.
The doctor’s recommendation is testing which ”is largely free. More, the medication is free for these patients. Hepatitis C is curable, and for hepatitis B and HIV, the drugs that are currently under study bring very interesting data for healing.
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