HCV infection risk during blood splash incident

[mavis2017]

Need help and advice from this community experts.
Last week I helped a person who met with an accident at road side. The person was lied on the road with pool of blood and upon helping him to sit down his blood splashed on top of my left foot up to ankle(was wearing sandals and short pant). Few days later I visited him and got to know that he is a HCV patient with genotype 3a. I got panicked as I was exposed to his blood while helping him on the other day. My question is, what is the risk of contracting HCV during this incident. I had no wounds or cuts at my left foot area. Is there any risk of infection? Pls help to advise. Thanks.

[mavis2017]

I shared with him medhelp forum details and get some advice from the experts. Even talked to the docs who treating him and they really appreciate the efforts. I showed them your posts. He is in his 40s and yet to get into any treatment. Any idea how much will it cost to get treated for GT3a? He's from Singapore. And what is the lifespan for HCV patients with GT3a if not treated due to cost issues?

[flyinlynn]

Life span depends on severity of liver disease. Most people do not develop severe liver disease and can live a normal life span. Most common symptom of hep c is tiredness so having hep c can effect quality of life.

If he has advanced liver disease or live cirrhosis treating and curing hep c will increase his life span.

I am not familiar with how to obtain treatment except in the US. I would think he should start with his doctor and go from there. They will be best to guide him on which treatments are available to him and what the costs would be in his country.

Yes Epclusa is the new medicine with a good cure rate for most genotypes of hep c including GT 3 there are other medicines still in testing.

Just to add I was infected with hep c GT 1a for 37 years I did develop cirrhosis after being infected for 30 years. I have been living with cirrhosis for 9 years.

[mavis2017]

Hope you are doing good. Were you in any treatment before developing cirrhosis?

[mavis2017]

Epclusa looks very promising and hope we will have more better cure rates for all GTs. I've learned so much from this forum.

[flyinlynn]

I treated 3 times with the old interferon based treatments. First time was just interferon shots 3 times a week. Second time was after ribavirin was approved and interferon was improved so that was one shot of interferon a week and ribavirin pills. Later I was in a clinical trial with interferon, ribavirin and a clinical trial medicine.

Each treatment was for 6 months duration. I was a null responder to treatment in that my viral load did not decrease at al while taking the medicines.

Yes I am doing fine I am going to college full time and working.

[flyinlynn]

Hep c infected blood must enter the blood stream of an uninfected person for infection to be transmitted. If you had no open (wet weeping) wounds you are not at risk

[mavis2017]

Thanks for the reply flyinlynn. It really helps to reduce my anxiety. Just another quick question. Among all the HCV genotypes, what are the genotypes easy to cure and which are not. Is genotype 3a easy to cure with existing antiviral therapies?

[flyinlynn]

Formerly it was GT 1a was the most difficult to cure but the newest medicines are very good at 98% cure for GT 1a now. So this puts GT 3 as most difficult to cure but I believe the new meds are still doing greater than 85% cure and there are newer meds coming down the pipeline. Still much better than the old interferon cure rate for GT1 which was between 14 and 30% cure rate.

[flyinlynn]

Is this person planning on getting treatment?

[mavis2017]

While searching the net for GT 3a treatment, found the following infos:

"All genotypes – Epclusa is the first HCV medication that can successfully treat all six genotypes."

[http://hepatitisc.hcvadvocate.org/2016/08/hcv-drugs-alan-franciscus-editor-in-chief-5.html]
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and the great part about treatment cost in India:

"How I Got the $84,000 Hepatitis C Drug For $1500 by Buying It From India"

http://www.alternet.org/personal-health/84000-hep-c-drug-only-1500

Not sure how reliable this infos. Need inputs from forum experts. Pls help to advise on this

[flyinlynn]

Most of those quotes are probably for Harvoni. The cost of Harvoni in other countries is much lower than in the US. A 12 week course of Harvoni costs $ 84,000 in the US. yes the generic form of Harvoni is available in other countries but Harvoni has been approved for over 2 years now. I don't think a generic form of Epclusa is available yet. Not even sure if Eclupsa is approved in countries other than the US so far it was only approved last summer in the US I think.