Towards hepatitis C virus elimination in high-burden resource-limited settings: Focus on Pakistan. Dr Aaron Lim, University of Bristol

The World Health Organization (WHO) has set targets to eliminate hepatitis C virus (HCV) as a global public health issue by 2030, advocating for a reduction in HCV incidence by 80% and HCV-related mortality by 65% by 2030 compared to 2015. Pakistan is a low-middle income country (LMIC) that is now likely to have the world’s largest HCV burden. With increasing access to highly effective direct-acting antiviral (DAA) HCV treatment, Pakistan is aiming for the WHO HCV elimination targets. However, low levels of diagnosis and referral present challenges to treatment scale-up. In this talk, I will discuss how we are using modelling to estimate the impact and costs of screening and treatment interventions in Pakistan to achieve country-wide HCV elimination by 2030.