Hepatitis Awareness Month 2025

The month of May is designated as Hepatitis Awareness Month in the United States, and May 19th is Hepatitis Testing Day. During May, CDC and our public health partners work to shed light on the impact of these hidden epidemics by raising awareness of viral hepatitis while encouraging testing and vaccination. Hepatitis Awareness Month activities help to improve everyone’s understanding of viral hepatitis transmission and risk factors and to decrease social stigma against viral hepatitis.

Hepatitis A and hepatitis B are vaccine preventable and hepatitis C can be cured.

Hepatitis A infection usually causes a mild, short-term illness. Vaccination is the best way to prevent infection.

Most people with hepatitis B or hepatitis C do not look or feel sick. Getting tested is the only way to know if you have either virus and get treatment, which can prevent serious health problems including liver damage, liver cancer, and even death.

Although there is no cure for hepatitis B, treatments are available that can delay or reduce the risk of developing liver cancer.

There is currently no vaccine to prevent hepatitis C, but curative treatments are available. Most people with hepatitis C can be cured with just 8–12 weeks of well-tolerated oral-only treatment. Testing is the first step.

The purpose of Hepatitis Awareness Month is to educate health care practitioners and the public about the importance of vaccination against hepatitis A and hepatitis B and the importance of testing and treatment for hepatitis B and hepatitis C.

May 19 is National Hepatitis Testing Day. The goal of National Hepatitis Testing Day is to help raise awareness about viral hepatitis and to encourage more individuals to learn their status. All adults aged 18 years and older are recommended to be screened at least once in their lifetimes for hepatitis B and hepatitis C. 

In April 2025, CDC published the 2023 Viral Hepatitis Surveillance Report and 2025 Viral Hepatitis National Progress Report. These reports contain hepatitis A, hepatitis B, and hepatitis C disease trends that inform the nation's viral hepatitis response and monitor progress towards national elimination goals.

For more information:

• 2023 Viral Hepatitis Surveillance Report
  
• 2025 Viral Hepatitis National Progress Report

• Share the ABCs of Viral Hepatitis to help others learn facts about the three most common types of viral hepatitis in the US.
• Register your testing services by visiting GetTested: CDC's National HIV, STD, and Hepatitis Testing site and filling out the online form.

Share graphics and posts from our social media toolkit to promote Hepatitis Awareness Month and National Hepatitis Testing Day. We recommend using the following hashtags: #HepatitisAwarenessMonth, #NationalHepatitisTestingDay, and #HepAware.

 During National Immunization Awareness Month (NIAM) in August, the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) will be promoting new resources for families and pediatricians, many of them translated into more languages to get these important messages to more families. In addition, the AAP will be promoting its YouTube course on immunization: For New Parents, The Complete Guide to Childhood Vaccinations.

For pediatricians, new resources will help communicate with families in every community. The Academy will be promoting translated discussion guides, now available in many new languages including Chinese and Korean. A full set of these will be available in time for NIAM by the end of July. There will also be resources available on HealthyChildren.org, including “Measles: What Parents Need to Know,” now translated into Somali, Nepali, Haitian Creole, Hmong, Arabic, and Russian. A new Ukrainian translation is coming soon. Other resources include:

• HPV vaccination reminder postcards for clinics available in English, Chinese and Spanish
• Adolescent Immunization Discussion Guides (aap.org)
• Measles (Patient Care)

On social media, the AAP will be sharing messages from the AAP’s Immunizations Campaign Toolkit, including:

• Video: Flu/COVID
• Video: Childhood immunizations

Vaccines have dramatically changed medicine over the last century. Before vaccines, parents in the United States could expect that every year:

• Polio would paralyze 10,000 children.
• Pertussis (whooping cough) would kill 8,000 infants.
• Measles would infect about 4 million children, killing about 500.
• Rubella (German measles) would cause birth defects and intellectual disabilities in as many as 20,000 newborns.
• Diphtheria would be one of the most common causes of death in school-aged children.
• A bacterium called Haemophilus influenzae type b (Hib) would cause meningitis in 15,000 children, leaving many with permanent brain damage.

Click here for additional resources from CDC: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention NIAM website.

National Infant Immunization Week (NIIW) is a yearly observance held in April, highlighting the importance of protecting children two years and younger from vaccine-preventable diseases (VPDs). NIIW is April 22-29, 2024. 

CDC and the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) recommend that children stay on track with their well-child appointments and routine vaccinations. On-time vaccination is critical to provide protection against potentially life-threatening diseases. Learn more at CDC: National Infant Immunization Week (NIIW). 

Articles – Good topics for articles include anything related to your company – recent changes to operations, the latest company softball game – or the industry you’re in. General business trends (think national and even international) are great article fodder, too.

Use these resources and promotional materials to participate in NIIW and help support childhood immunization.

• CDC: Talking with Parents about Vaccines for Infants
  Health care provider resources for vaccine conversations with parents.
• CDC: Communication and Print Resources
  Vaccine and immunization resources for Health care providers.
• CDC: NIIW sample key messages
  Key messages to encourage parents to stay up to date on their child's vaccines.