Author information

• ¹Department of Pediatrics, University of Colorado School of Medicine, Adult and Child Center for Health Outcomes Research and Delivery Science (ACCORDS), University of Colorado/Children's Hospital Colorado, Mailstop F443, 1890 North Revere Court, Aurora, CO 80045, USA.
• ²Department of Pediatrics, University of Colorado School of Medicine, Adult and Child Center for Health Outcomes Research and Delivery Science (ACCORDS), University of Colorado/Children's Hospital Colorado, Mailstop F443, 1890 North Revere Court, Aurora, CO 80045, USA. Electronic address: Sean.Oleary@cuanschutz.edu.

Abstract

Hepatitis B virus (HBV) is efficiently transmitted to newborn infants in the perinatal period and can lead to chronic infection, cirrhosis, liver cancer, and death. Despite the availability of effective prevention measures necessary to eliminate perinatal HBV transmission, significant gaps remain in the implementation of these prevention measures. All clinicians who care for pregnant persons and their newborn infants need to know the key prevention measures including (1) identification of HBV surface antigen (HBsAg)-positive pregnant persons, (2) antiviral treatment of HBsAg-positive pregnant persons with high viral loads, (3) timely postexposure prophylaxis of infants born to HBsAg-positive persons, (4) and timely universal vaccination of newborn infants.