There are a lot of similarities between a disease caused by viruses of Hepatitis (B and C) and HIV.

These are as follows :

1. Both are acquired through invasive sex.
2. Both can be acquired through blood transfusion and other blood products.
3. Both can co-exist and each can increase the severity of other disease and can cause therapeutic problems.
4. Both make patients susceptible to malignancy, Hepatitis virus to hepatomas of liver and HIV to malignancies like lymphomas and Kaposi’s sarcoma.
5. Both the viruses can be transferred through doctors, who are not careful while operating or doing interventional procedures.
6. The disease produced by both the viruses, for example chronic hepatitis (cirrhosis) by Hepatitis B and C, and clinical AIDS by HIV, appears 10-15 years after the patient is infected.
7. Only rich patients can afford the treatment of both the illnesses caused by these viruses, while in practice both the diseases are more common among poor patients.
8. Any doctor, however senior he may be, may miss both the diseases caused by these viruses. In such a case, private practice can be made or lost by the above diseases.
9. Both the viruses are usually picked up in a good health check up, where the hospital or private clinics are mature enough to include HIV, HBsAg and anti-HCV as routine blood tests.
10. Both the viruses are more common in alcoholics and promiscuous men.
11. The diseases caused by both these viruses can be treated with Interferon or HARTT treatment, though not cured.
12. Lately, we have been using the same drugs to treat diseases caused by both the viruses. For example, lamivudine, adefovir or tenofovir for treating AIDS and Hepatitis B. Also protease inhibitors like saquinovir are being used for treating patients having diseases due to AIDS and Hepatitis C.
13. Just as in HIV infection blood test can be negative for a few hours or 1 to 2 days immediately after exposure, in acute hepatitis, anti-HCV can also be negative for sometime (few days to few weeks) before it becomes positive. Thus, occasionally the diagnosis of both the above viruses can be missed, even in the best laboratories.