ISLAMABAD: Federal Minister for Health Mustafa Kamal has declared hepatitis C a national emergency, stressing that the time to keep silence has passed and that Pakistan must now take decisive action to eliminate the disease.
Speaking on the occasion of World Hepatitis Day, the minister said the country can no longer afford to lose precious lives to a disease that is preventable, detectable and curable.
The minister stated that the gathering was not merely to observe an international day but to reaffirm Pakistan’s commitment to ending hepatitis C. He said hepatitis C was no longer just a public health issue but a national emergency requiring an urgent and coordinated response.
Highlighting the scale of the challenge, Mr Kamal said Pakistan carried high burden of hepatitis C, with more than 10 million people living with the virus and approximately 110,000 new infections reported each year.
He said that these figures cannot be treated as routine statistics and required immediate national attention.
The availability of modern antiviral medicines has made hepatitis C a curable disease with more than 95 per cent of patients able to achieve complete recovery through timely diagnosis and treatment.
He said the Prime Minister’s National Hepatitis C Elimination Programme represents far more than a policy announcement. It reflects the government’s firm commitment to ensuring early identification of patients through free screening, free diagnostic testing and free treatment. He added that the programme will be expanded across the country in phases with the objective of screening more than 164 million people.
He added that the federal government was directly implementing the programme in Islamabad Capital Territory, Azad Jammu and Kashmir and Gilgit-Baltistan, while working closely with provincial governments to gradually extend its coverage nationwide. He expressed confidence that with collective national efforts, Pakistan can achieve the goal of becoming Hepatitis-free by 2030.
Meanwhile, the World Health Organisation (WHO) has called on all stakeholders to take urgent science-based action. It renewed its support for Pakistan’s efforts to advance towards the goal of ending hepatitis as a public health problem by 2030.
Hepatitis is a deadly disease that affects an estimated 12.9 million people in Pakistan, including nine million with hepatitis C and 3.8 million with hepatitis B. Every year, more than 48,000 people die in Pakistan due to hepatitis infections that are preventable and curable. This equals one death every 11 minutes.
WHO stands with Pakistan to accelerate research and innovation, integrate hepatitis services into universal health coverage, enhance prevention, including vaccination, and ensure equitable access to quality hepatitis testing and treatment for every family, regardless of social or economic status,” said WHO Representative in Pakistan Dr Luo Dapeng.
According to the WHO Global Hepatitis Report 2026, viral hepatitis B and C – the two infections responsible for 95pc of hepatitis-related deaths worldwide – claimed 1.34 million lives in 2024. At the same time, transmission continues with more than 4,900 new infections every day.
Published in Dawn, July 29th, 2026