World Hepatitis Day 2026: “Hepatitis: Let’s Break It Down”

Every year on 28 July, World Hepatitis Day raises awareness of viral hepatitis and the urgent need to prevent, diagnose and treat infections with hepatitis viruses. More than 280 million people worldwide are living with chronic hepatitis B or C, the leading causes of liver cirrhosis and liver cancer. Together, these infections are responsible for an estimated 1.3 million deaths each year.

28 July 2026

While chronic hepatitis C is now curable with antiviral medicines, a major challenge is that most infections remain undiagnosed. Furthermore, treatment alone cannot prevent reinfection, faces global access barriers, and cannot overcome treatment-resistant genotypes. Therefore, a preventive vaccine remains one of the key missing tools needed to eliminate the major public health threat caused by this disease globally. Developing such a vaccine is a priority identified by the World Health Organization (WHO).

The World Hepatitis Day 2026 campaign calls for stronger political commitment, sustained investment, and expanded equitable access to prevention, testing, treatment and care. These priorities underscore the importance of continued investment in research and innovation to develop the next generation of tools needed to eliminate viral hepatitis as a public health threat.

The European Vaccine Initiative (EVI) is proud to contribute to the global effort to prevent viral hepatitis through its involvement in the HCVIVA project. Coordinated by Copenhagen University Hospital - Hvidovre, the consortium also includes Nuvonis, Statens Serum Institute, AJ Vaccines A/S and the University of Copenhagen. Together, the partners are working to advance a novel prophylactic hepatitis C vaccine towards first-in-human clinical trials.

Encouraging preclinical results indicate that the inactivated vaccine candidate has the potential to induce broadly neutralising antibodies capable of recognising highly diverse hepatitis C virus isolates. This represents an important step towards overcoming one of the greatest challenges in hepatitis C vaccine development: achieving broad protection against a virus with extraordinarily high genetic and antigenic heterogeneity.

If successful, an effective hepatitis C vaccine could complement existing curative therapies by preventing new infections, reducing transmission, and accelerating progress towards the WHO goal of eliminating viral hepatitis as a public health threat. With approximately one million new hepatitis C virus infections occurring each year, a vaccine could have a profound impact on global health.

The path to elimination of viral hepatitis as a public health threat requires more than scientific breakthroughs. It depends on sustained political commitment, continued investment in research and innovation, and equitable access to both existing interventions and future preventive tools. EVI is proud to help translate scientific discovery into solutions with the potential to improve lives worldwide and looks forward to the next milestones in the HCVIVA project.

Acknowledgements:

HCVIVA - Hepatitis C Virus Inactivated Vaccine Advancement project is funded by Innovation Fund Denmark (IFD). 

Coordinated by RegionH Hvidovre Hospital (DK), other partners include Nuvonis (AT), Statens Serum Institute (DK), AJ Vaccines A/S (DK) and University of Copenhagen (DK).