Hepatitis B

n. hepatitis caused by the hepatitis B virus and transmitted through blood and other bodily fluids (can also be transmitted by sexual contact, injection of infected blood)

Hepatitis B is an inflammation of the liver and is caused by the Hepatitis B virus (HBV), a member of the Hepadnavirus family and one of hundreds of unrelated viral species which cause viral hepatitis. It was originally known as "serum hepatitis" and has caused current epidemics in parts of Asia and Africa. Hepatitis B is recognized as endemic in China and various other parts of Asia. The proportion of the world's population currently infected with the virus is 3 to 6%, but up to a third have been exposed. Symptoms of the acute illness caused by the virus include liver inflammation, vomiting, jaundice, and rarely, death. Chronic hepatitis B may cause liver cirrhosis which may then lead to liver cancer, a fatal disease with very poor response to current chemotherapy.
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Hepatitis due to the hepatitis B virus once thought to be passed only through blood products and so called serum hepatitis. Now known to be passed also by needle sticks, body piercing and tattooing (if proper sterilization or disposable one-use instruments are not used), dialysis, sexual and even less intimate close contact, and childbirth.

A virus that causes hepatitis (inflammation of the liver). It is carried and passed to others through blood or sexual contact. Also, infants born to infected mothers may become infected with the virus.

Noun
1. an acute (sometimes fatal) form of viral hepatitis caused by a DNA virus that tends to persist in the blood serum and is transmitted by sexual contact or by transfusion or by ingestion of contaminated blood or other bodily fluids
(synonym) serum hepatitis
(hypernym) viral hepatitis