Hepatitis B vaccination is the most important and effective preventive measure.
Furthermore, to prevent hepatitis B, attention must be paid to reducing risk factors.
Behavioral risk factors
- Consumption of stimulants
- Alcohol (woman: > 40 g/day; man: > 60 g/day).
- Drug use (intravenous, i.e., through the vein).
- Shared use of everyday objects such as nail scissors or razor.
- Pierce ear hole
- Piercings
- Tattoos
- Sexual transmission
- Promiscuity (sexual contact with relatively frequently changing different partners or with parallel multiple partners).
- Prostitution
- Men who have sex with men (MSM).
- Sexual contacts in the vacation country
- Unprotected coitus (sexual intercourse)
Medication
- Blood products
Other risk factors
- Horizontal infection (non-sexual) – pathogen transmission from host to host of the same generation:
- Health care workers
- Residents and employees of care facilities
- Inmates
- Vertical infection – pathogen transmission from a host (here. the mother) to its offspring (here: the child):
- Transmission of infection during birth from mother to child (perinatal) [risk of transmission: 90%].
- Transmission through breast milk (postnatal infection).
- Iatrogenic (“physician-generated”) transmission.
Post-exposure prophylaxis (PEP)
Post-exposure prophylaxis is the provision of medication to prevent disease in individuals who are not protected against a particular disease by vaccination but have been exposed to it. For more information, see “Drug therapy.”
