Science Questions

Can Hepatitis B be transferred in urine?

We put this to Graeme Alexander:

Graeme -   When I meet patients in the clinic, I get two types of question.  One, from a patient who’s scared that they’ll transmit hepatitis B to someone they love  - and then the other, from the person that they love, wondering if they’ll catch it from their partner.  And the answer is that you can't catch hepatitis B from urine.  These viruses are actually quite difficult to catch, both hepatitis B and hepatitis C.  And hepatitis B is acquired largely by contact with blood or through sex and hepatitis C pretty well only by contact through blood.  So, you can live with someone for many, many years and not catch hepatitis B or C from them because close contact in the family situation is entirely safe.

Chris -   And I think the other mitigation is that there is a good vaccine for hep-B, isn’t there?  So if we identify people in a family situation who have one carrier and one person who isn’t infected, we can vaccinate the uninfected person to protect them.

Graeme -   It’s probably the most effective vaccine that we’ve ever come across, very effective and very safe once you've been vaccinated.

December 2009