Mayor Gavin Newsom and Congressman Mike Honda Join 500 People to get Tested for Hepatitis B at the 2nd Annual Asian Heritage Street Celebration

San Francisco, CA (PRWEB) may 24, 2006

San Francisco is one of the major U.S. cities where chronic hepatitis B is a serious health problem due to a large Asian Pacific Islander American population. over 500 people from San Francisco’s Asian Pacific American community including Congressman Mike Honda and Mayor Gavin Newsom received free hepatitis B screenings at the 2nd Annual Asian Heritage Street Celebration on Saturday, may 20th. The Asian Liver Center at Stanford University provided free hepatitis B screenings at 2151 Irving Street, Suite 205 from 11 am to 4pm located in the Sunset District of San Francisco. Partners in this united effort included San Francisco’s Department of Public Health, the Chinese Hospital, the API Wellness Center, the Association of Asian Pacific Community Health Organizations and the APIA Health Forum.

“As Chair of the Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus, I want to say it loud and clear so that there is no misunderstanding: Hepatitis B is a public health emergency, especially for Asian Pacific Islander Americans,” said Representative Mike Honda, Chair, Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus. “We need to break the silence and bring awareness to our community about this disease. Hepatitis B diagnosis does not have to be a death sentence. The weapons to combat this disease are available, including screening, vaccination, early diagnosis and treatments.”

Earlier this month, Fiona Ma presented a Proclamation to Dr. Samuel so on behalf of Mayor Gavin Newsom to declare the week of may 14-20 as “Hepatitis B Awareness Week in San Francisco.” “this is an issue near and dear to my heart, because I myself am a hepatitis B carrier,” said Ma. Fiona Ma did not learn she had chronic hepatitis B until she tried to give blood at the age of 22. now 40, the member of the Board of Supervisors is hoping her story will encourage other Asian Americans, who are at greater risk, to get tested for the deadly disease.

“San Francisco is one of the major U.S. cities where chronic hepatitis B is a serious health problem due to our large Asian Pacific Islander American population,” said Mayor Gavin Newsom. “The free hepatitis B screenings that the Asian Liver Center conducted at this year’s Asian Heritage Street Celebration are a great way to educate and raise awareness about this major health threat to our community.”

“We are so pleased that over 500 people came out to get tested for hepatitis B,” said Dr. Samuel so, Director, Asian Liver Center at Stanford University. “There are an estimated 25,000 APIAs living in the city of San Francisco with chronic hepatitis B, and an additional 100,000 who are unprotected. There’s a real need for increased hepatitis B testing and vaccination in the APIA community. more than half of the deaths from hepatitis B are from our community, yet the seriousness of this disease is underappreciated, underdiagnosed, and undertreated. We are grateful for the support of our community partners for promoting awareness and prevention of this silent epidemic.”

“With the support of GlaxoSmithKline in partnership with the Asian Liver Center at Stanford University, we believe raising awareness and being able to provide a platform for Hepatitis B screenings added a very important element to the 2nd Annual Asian Heritage Street Celebration” said James Fang, Co-chair, Asian Heritage Street Celebration. “We are very pleased that so many people were able to attend the festival to get tested.”

Hepatitis B is the most common serious liver infection in the world caused by the hepatitis B virus that attacks the liver and can cause liver cancer. it is more common among APIA’s than other racial or ethnic groups in the U.S. According to the Asian Liver Center at Stanford University, an estimated 1 in 10 foreign born APIAs is chronically infected with hepatitis B, compared to 1 in 1000 Caucasian Americans. Many are not aware they have been infected, since there are usually no symptoms. without appropriate monitoring or treatment, 1 in 4 of these chronically infected individuals will die from liver cancer or liver failure. Liver cancer, largely caused by hepatitis B, is the second leading cause of cancer death for APIA men living in the U.S.

About The Asian Liver Center at Stanford University

The Asian Liver Center at Stanford University is the only non-profit organization in the United States that addresses the high incidence of hepatitis B and liver cancer in Asians and Asian Americans. Founded in 1996, the ALC has grown to become a national and international leader in fighting this global epidemic through outreach, education, and research. For more information, visit liver.stanford.edu.

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Researchers have linked exposure to dirty air to changes in a gene that, in turn, is connected to more severe asthma symptoms.

Exposure to dirty air is linked to decreased function of a gene that appears to increase the severity of asthma in children, according to a joint study by researchers at Stanford University and UC Berkeley.

While air pollution is known to be a source of immediate inflammation, this new study provides one of the first pieces of direct evidence that explains how some ambient air pollutants could have long-term effects.

The findings, published in the October issue of the Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology, come from a study of 181 children with and without asthma in Fresno and Palo Alto.

The researchers found that air pollution exposure suppressed the immune system’s regulatory T cells (Treg), and that the decreased level of Treg function was linked to greater severity of asthma symptoms and lower lung capacity. Treg cells are responsible for putting the brakes on the immune system so that it doesn’t react to non-pathogenic substances in the body that are associated with allergy and asthma. when Treg function is low, the cells fail to block the inflammatory responses that are the hallmark of asthma symptoms.

The findings have potential implications for altered birth outcomes associated with polluted air, much the same as those noted for the effects of cigarette smoke.

“when it came out that cigarettes can cause molecular changes, it meant the possibility that mothers who smoked could affect the DNA of their children during fetal development,” said study lead author Dr. Kari Nadeau, pediatrician at Stanford’s Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital and an assistant professor of allergy and immunology at Stanford’s School of Medicine. “Similarly, these new findings suggest the possibility of an inheritable effect from environmental pollution.”

Forty-one participants came from the Fresno Asthmatic Children’s Environment Study (FACES), a longitudinal study led by principal investigator Dr. Ira Tager, professor of epidemiology at UC Berkeley’s School of Public Health, and co-principal investigator S. Katharine Hammond, UC Berkeley professor and chair of environmental health sciences. the researchers also recruited 30 children from Fresno who did not have asthma.

“I’m not aware of any other studies that have looked at how chemicals can alter cells so early in the regulatory process, and then connected that effect to clinical symptoms,” said Tager. “there are people who still question the direct link between air pollution and human health, but these findings make the health impact of pollutants harder to deny.”