LEXINGTON, Ky. (May 16, 2019) – Jennifer Havens, Ph.D., professor of behavioral science in the University of Kentucky College of Medicine, faculty member in the Center on Drug and Alcohol Research and member of the team awarded $87 million through the National Institutes of Health’s HEALing Communities study, has spent the past decade studying the transmission of infectious disease and advocating for the expansion of harm reduction programs. That work entails understanding the link between two health burdens facing the nation, the opioid crisis and cancer.
These two health burdens may seem unrelated but research shows they are linked. Hepatitis C virus (HCV) is a blood borne viral infection that causes liver inflammation, which can cause liver damage. Untreated HCV, or significantly delayed treatment, can lead to the development of Hepatocellular Carcinoma, liver cancer. Havens has been examining the rise of injection drug use and the related outbreak of HCV.
With $15 million from the National Cancer Institute and National Institute on Drug Abuse and a donation of 900 doses of a 12-week treatment from Gilead Sciences Inc., Havens has the goal of eradicating HCV in Perry County.
A link between the opioid crisis and cancer may not be an association many people make. Prior to 1992, hepatitis C was most commonly transmitted through blood transfusions and organ donations. Today, it is commonly transmitted through the sharing of paraphernalia used to inject drugs. Because many people who inject drugs (PWID) become infected with HCV, curing it is important to preventing the development of liver cancer and to the prevention of the spread of the disease.