Hepatitis C virus (HCV) is a blood-borne virus that causes chronic disease in up to 85% of infected individuals. Ongoing HCV also causes insulin resistance (IR), a condition in which higher than normal concentrations of insulin are required to maintain normal blood glucose levels. Often, IR leads to the development of diabetes.

Historically, rates of HCV cure were substantially lower among patients with IR or diabetes. A new class of medications called the direct acting antiviral (DAA) agents is available to cure chronic HCV. DAA agents have cure rates well above 90%, which is a dramatic improvement over older HCV medications.  DAA based treatment regimens are becoming the mainstay of HCV therapy. However, whether or not IR or diabetes affects cure rates of chronic HCV with the new DAA medications was, until recently, unknown.

Dr. Blake Niccum MD and colleagues published a recent report demonstrating that preexisting diabetes was not associated with a reduced rate of HCV cure in patients treated with DAA-based regimens. This report is important because both uncured HCV and diabetes have adverse impacts on the liver and lead to the development of fibrosis or scar tissue, cirrhosis and liver cancer. For this reason increasing HCV eradication would improve the progression of liver scarring and decrease the burden of the liver cancer.

See the the article in full here:

Success of Direct-Acting, Antiviral-Based Therapy for Chronic Hepatitis C Is Not Affected by Type 2 Diabetes.