Students in schools across Bengal are taking a pledge not to share blades or tattooing needles to prevent hepatitis infections as part of an effort to prevent and eliminate viral hepatitis.

The pledge, being taken in the prayer sessions, was read out in some schools on Saturday. Some others will take the pledge on Monday.

Sunday was World Hepatitis Day.

“We have been working to raise awareness and prevent viral hepatitis for the last 18 years. The pledge in the school assembly is part of that awareness generation and prevention programme,” said Partha Sarathi Mukherjee, secretary of Liver Foundation, an NGO that works towards eradication of liver diseases.

The Liver Foundation had floated the idea of the pledge to the state health department that then got in touch with the school education department to implement it.

The foundation organised a rally in the city with schoolchildren and others on Sunday.

“WHO has set a target to eliminate hepatitis by 2030. We have to prevent occurrence to eliminate hepatitis. If we can inform the students about the measures they need to take, it will reach many families through them,” said Mukherjee.

WHO defines hepatitis as “an inflammation of the liver that is caused by a variety of infectious viruses and noninfectious agents leading to a range of health problems, some of which can be fatal”.

There five main strains of the hepatitis virus are A, B, C, D and E. An official of the state health department said hepatitis B and C were more worrying because they can lead to chronic diseases.

WHO’s website says “types B and C lead to chronic disease in hundreds of millions of people and together are the most common cause of liver cirrhosis, liver cancer and viral hepatitis-related deaths”.

The pledge says the student “shall ensure complete and timely Hepatitis B vaccination of the newborns” in the family and surroundings and “encourage others to adhere to the codes of sanitation, that is NOT to share personal commodities such as blade, razor, toothbrush, towel or the tattooing needle”.

It also says hepatitis A and E are water and food-borne.

“I shall wash hands before eating, and eat healthy and drink healthy,” the pledge says.

A health department official said the best prevention against hepatitis B is vaccination available at birth. Adults who are not vaccinated can also take the vaccine, said the official.

Hepatitis C has no vaccine but it is curable. “Three to six months of treatment can cure someone who tests positive for hepatitis C,” he said.

Hepatitis B has no cure but it can be kept under control through treatment.

The official said the worry with viral hepatitis was that it was the only communicable disease that was showing an increase in mortality rate.