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JIPH-647; No. of Pages 2 ARTICLE IN PRESS

Journal of Infection and Public Health xxx (2017) xxxxxx

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Journal of Infection and Public Health

journal homepage: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/jiph

Letter to the Editor

Global impact of the World Hepatitis Day 2016:
An evaluation using Google Trends
Dear Editor,
Viral hepatitis is the most common cause of liver disease in the
world with more than 400 million people infected with hepatitis
B or hepatitis C, over 10 times the number of people infected with
HIV and over half the worlds population exposed to the different
hepatotropic viruses [1]. Unlike most communicable diseases, the
absolute burden and relative rank of viral hepatitis has increased
the last decade with a high economic health cost, making it a lead
cause of death and disability worldwide [2].
In response of this public health problem, the World Health
Assembly designated July 28 as a World Hepatitis Day (WHD), com-
memorating the birthday of Dr. Baruch Blumberg, who discovered
the hepatitis B virus and developed the rst hepatitis B vaccine [3].
Every year, this day is an opportunity around the world for rais-
ing the people and health policy makers for more knowledge and
awareness to ensure a better approach for prevention, control and
treatment of viral hepatitis in the communities [3]. However, the
impact of that day activities may vary in each country.
The interest about Hepatitis in the population can be evaluated
using data of the internet searches of information related to this
disease. Trend data generated by the number of Google searches
over time have recently been made available by Google Trends, a
feature used in previous studies for surveillance in public health
[4,5].
In order to assess the impact of World Hepatitis Day celebrated
on July 28, 2016, an analysis in Google Trends (https://www.google.
com/trends/) was performed, using the term hepatitis as a main
operator to identify searches related to this disease.
During JanuaryJuly 2016, the average interest rate was
60.9 7.9 with a stable pattern of searches in this period. However,
a peak of interest was identied during the World Hepatitis Day
(July 28) reaching a value of 100 (Fig. 1), making this day the most
popular with the highest value of interest search in 2016. During
this day, according to the most popular topics and the searches
with excessive increase, the interest on hepatitis was focused in
symptoms, types of hepatitis, its relation with HIV/AIDS, forms of

Fig. 1. Worldwide interest search about hepatitis and trends in time for the 2016 using Google Trends.

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jiph.2016.09.015
1876-0341/ 2016 King Saud Bin Abdulaziz University for Health Sciences. Published by Elsevier Limited. All rights reserved.

Please cite this article in press as: Ortiz-Martinez Y, Rios-Gonzlez CM. Global impact of the World Hepatitis Day 2016: An evaluation
using Google Trends. J Infect Public Health (2017), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jiph.2016.09.015
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JIPH-647; No. of Pages 2 ARTICLE IN PRESS
2 Letter to the Editor / Journal of Infection and Public Health xxx (2017) xxxxxx
transmission and vaccine. About the geographic distribution, the
country with the highest interest on hepatitis was Bolivia, followed
by Nigeria, Guatemala, Iran, Venezuela and Kazakhstan. The lowest
participation was observed in the African countries (Fig. 1).
With the analysis using Google Trends we appreciate the peak
of popularity of the disease during the WHD, achieving a signicant
impact in most of the countries. These results highlight that cam-
paigns carried out during the WHD inform and generate interest
about Hepatitis in the population, reected in a relative increase in
the active search for information, which translates into an improve-
ment of the overall knowledge and awareness of the disease, the
rst step to the development of effective and preventive strategies
aimed at controlling these viruses.
Funding
No funding sources.
Competing interests
None declared.
Ethical approval
Not required.
Please cite this article in press as: Ortiz-Martinez Y, Rios-Gonzlez CM. Global impact of the World Hepatitis Day 2016: An evaluation
using Google Trends. J Infect Public Health (2017), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jiph.2016.09.015
References
[1] WHO. World Hepatitis Day, 28 July; 2016. http://www.who.int/campaigns/
hepatitis-day/2016/en/. [Accessed 25 August 2016].
[2] Stanaway JD, Flaxman AD, Naghavi M, Fitzmaurice C, Vos T, Abubakar I,
et al. The global burden of viral hepatitis from 1990 to 2013: ndings from
the Global Burden of Disease Study 2013. Lancet 2016;388(10049):10818,
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(16)30579-7.
[3] Ward JW, Averhoff FM, Koh HK. World Hepatitis Day: a new era for hepatitis
control. Lancet 2011;378(9791):5523.
[4] Tejada-Llacsa PJ. Abortion Internet searches. An evaluation with Google Trends
in Peru. Gac Sanit SESPAS 2016;30(4):319.
[5] Seifter A, Schwarzwalder A, Geis K, Aucott J. The utility of Google Trends
for epidemiological research: Lyme disease as an example. Geospat Health
2010;4(2):1357.
Yeimer Ortiz-Martinez
Faculty of Health Sciences, University of Sucre,
Sincelejo, Colombia
Carlos M. Rios-Gonzlez
Faculty of Medical Sciences, National University of
Caaguaz, Cnel. Oviedo, Paraguay
Corresponding author.
E-mail address: yeimer10@hotmail.com
(Y. Ortiz-Martinez)
29 August 2016