HCV treatment in children and young adults with HIV/HCV co-infection in Europe. Journal of Viral Eradication
Turkova et al. aimed to describe use of treatment for chronic hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection in HIV/HCV co-infected children and young people living in Europe and to evaluate treatment outcomes. Among the countries where patients received pegylated interferon alpha and ribavirin (peg-IFN/RBV), treatment rates were between 9% and 61% with an overall treatment rate of 24%. Factors associated with increased probability of HCV treatment were older age, advanced fibrosis and easier-to-treat genotypes (GTs). Twenty-fife patients out of fifty patients (50%) treated with peg-INF/RBV achieved sustained virological response (SVR) 24 with rates of 29% in GT 1,4 and of 80% in GT 2,3.
The study-results indicate that HCV treatment success appears to be lower in HIV/HCV co-infection and underscore the need to speed up approvals of new direct-acting antiviral combinations in children.