Because COVID-19 eliminated face-to-face events, this year the Hepatitis B Foundation observed World Hepatitis Day in a retrospective way, with images and videos from past World Hepatitis Day celebrations using the hashtag #ThrowbackWHD. Below is a photo of Hep United B partners with O'Liver (center) on the U.S. Capitol Building steps in 2017.

On World Hepatitis Day 2020, Dr. Timothy Block, the Foundation's president and co-founder (right), participated in the World Hepatitis Alliance’s live Twitter Relay, as did Rhea Racho, our public policy and program manager.

Also on July 28, Dr. Chari Cohen, the Hepatitis B Foundation's senior vice president, participated in a live discussion about the latest news on hepatitis B advocacy, drug development and related issues on a special World Hepatitis Day episode of the Global Liver Institute’s Facebook Live program. Dr. Cohen urged for viewers to "Be loud!" as an advocate for increasing government support for research, prevention and treatment. You can watch the “talk show” here.

Kate Moraras, the Hepatitis B Foundation's senior program director and director of Hep B United, was featured in a recent HepVu news story.

The Hepatitis B Foundation today (Aug. 18) is launching its new B the Voice Story Bank, a worldwide effort to gather the stories of people living with hepatitis B and their families.

Building upon the success of the Foundation’s global #justB campaign, which launched in partnership with Story Center and Association of Asian Pacific Community Health Organizations (AAPCHO) in May 2017, this new initiative expands this storytelling efforts to broader audiences. You can read more here.

Kurt and Janet had tried to adopt for five years when they received a placement of a baby whose mother was hepatitis B positive. Unsure of what that meant for them and the baby they hoped to adopt, they contacted the Hepatitis B Foundation. Through the Foundation, they learned how their daughter could be protected from the disease with a birth dose of the hepatitis B vaccine. You can learn more about their story here.

Hepcludex may help to control hepatitis delta better than interferon and it has been demonstrated in clinical trials to lower HDV levels and reduce liver inflammation. For more information about this medication, please click here.

For more about HDV and clinical trials, visit the Hepatitis B Foundation's Hepatitis Delta Connect website.

The 7th ANRS HBV Cure Workshop will be held as an online webinar on Sept. 16.

Endorsed by the Hepatitis B Foundation, ICE-HBV and INSERM, the event starts at 1 p.m. Central European Summer Time. It is free of charge but registration is required. You can find the program and register here.

researchers in hepatitis B and liver diseases for its online seminar series, which is free and open to anyone interested (pre-registration is required).

Upcoming seminars are listed below in "Events" and on the Institute's website here, where you also can watch recording of prior Blumberg 2020 Research Seminars.

Sept. 10: "Characterizing the interplay between hepatitis B virus X protein and Smc5/6" presented by Rudolf Beran, Ph.D., Gilead Sciences

Hepatitis B is the global pandemic no one talks about, yet nine in ten people worldwide have been infected. In 2015, the World Health Organization estimated that hepatitis B caused 887,000 deaths annually. Today, 292 million people have chronic hepatitis B. You can read more about it in our regularly updated blog here.

It’s easy to become a Champion! We rely on support from friends from all over the world to keep our programs and research going. By giving a small, monthly gift, you can help us find the cure and improve lives of people living with hepatitis B throughout the year! To become a Champion today, click here.

Health care students living with hepatitis B have encountered discriminatory policies at U.S. universities, though protection afforded by the Americans with Disabilities Act applies to them, according to the authors of a new commentary published in Public Health Reports, the official journal of the Office of the U.S. Surgeon General and the U.S. Public Health Service.

The authors include Kate Moraras, MPH (right). Read more here.

Journal of Community Health, July 23, 2020

In the United States, up to 2.2 million people have been chronically infected with hepatitis B virus (HBV). Many nail salon workers are at risk for HBV as they are coming from high-risk and traditionally underserved communities. Please read more here.

Hu Z, Ban H, Zheng H, Chang J, Guo J

PLOS Pathogens, July 23, 2020

Hepatitis B virus (HBV) replicates its genomic DNA via viral DNA polymerase self-primed reverse transcription of a RNA pre-genome in the nucleocapsid assembled by 120 core protein (Cp) dimers. The arginine-rich carboxyl-terminal domain (CTD) of Cp plays an important role in the selective packaging of viral DNA polymerase-pregenomic (pg) RNA complex into nucleocapsid. Please read more here.

Blumberg Institute seminar: "Characterizing the interplay between

hepatitis B virus X protein and Smc5/6"

Blumberg Institute seminar: "Integrated HBV DNA: Investigation of the

Architecture and Potential Clinical Implications"

'This is where the theme of the summit should go."