Finding people who have chronic hepatitis C is the entry point to treatment, and the country data show a wide gap in how much of the infected population has been diagnosed. Restricting the WHO observations to the 97 countries and areas dated 2024 gives a median diagnosis coverage of 12.0% and an unweighted mean of 18.2%. Forty-two observations are below 10%, another 26 are between 10% and 20%, and only seven are at 60% or higher. The distribution is therefore concentrated at the low end rather than around a common global level.
The denominator and numerator matter. This indicator is not the share of people who tested positive this year and it is not current HCV prevalence. WHO defines the HCV diagnosis measure cumulatively: people who were diagnosed with viraemic HCV and were later cured or naturally cleared can remain in the numerator. The denominator is an estimated total HCV infection population using the post-2015 framework. The result is best read as accumulated diagnosis coverage relative to the estimated infection burden, not as a simple snapshot of everyone currently viraemic.
Table of Contents
What the WHO hepatitis C diagnosis indicator measures
The WHO indicator metadata defines diagnosis coverage for hepatitis C as the proportion of people with viraemic HCV infection who have been diagnosed using HCV RNA or HCV core antigen evidence, including people who were diagnosed and subsequently cured. Country surveillance systems, health-facility reporting and laboratory records can provide the numerator. When direct national data are insufficient, WHO can use a consultative modelling process to produce country-calibrated estimates.
Three related measures should not be confused. An HCV antibody test can show past exposure but does not by itself establish current viraemia. Diagnosis coverage shows how much of the infected population has been identified. Treatment coverage or the treatment rate among people diagnosed measures the next stage of the care pathway. A country can therefore have broad diagnosis but weaker treatment linkage, or strong treatment among the diagnosed group while still leaving many infected people undiagnosed.
This distinction matters because hepatitis C is curable. The WHO hepatitis C fact sheet notes that direct-acting antiviral medicines can cure more than 95% of people with HCV infection. Reaching those medicines, however, generally requires that infection first be found and confirmed. Diagnosis coverage is therefore a practical measure of the front end of the hepatitis C care cascade rather than a complete measure of treatment success.
The 2024 median is 12.0% across 97 observations
Holding the reference year constant at 2024, the 97 observations have a median of 12.04% and an unweighted mean of 18.23%. The first quartile is 3.15% and the third quartile is 23.75%, so half of the reported values lie roughly between 3.2% and 23.8%. The mean is higher than the median because a small number of high observations pull the average upward. This is not a population-weighted global diagnosis rate; every country or area contributes one row regardless of its estimated HCV population.
The grouped distribution makes the low-end concentration clearer. Forty-two observations are below 10%, 26 are from 10% to under 20%, 15 are from 20% to under 40%, seven are from 40% to under 60%, and seven are at 60% or above. Combining the first two groups gives 68 of 97 observations below 20%. Only 14 are at 40% or higher. A single average therefore hides the fact that most of the observed countries sit well below the small upper cluster.
Egypt, Rwanda and Saudi Arabia are at the high end of the 2024 table
Egypt is reported at 101.82% in 2024, followed by Rwanda at 71.73%, Saudi Arabia at 67.73%, Andorra at 67.02%, Montenegro at 65.96%, Bosnia and Herzegovina at 65.55%, and Switzerland at 63.73%. Georgia is 58.98%, Mongolia 55.49% and Haiti 50.67%. These are the highest values in the same-year set, but the indicator should not be turned into a fine-grained league table because national surveillance systems, modelling inputs and reporting completeness can differ.
| Country or area | 2024 HCV diagnosis coverage |
|---|---|
| Egypt | 101.82% |
| Rwanda | 71.73% |
| Saudi Arabia | 67.73% |
| Andorra | 67.02% |
| Montenegro | 65.96% |
| Bosnia and Herzegovina | 65.55% |
| Switzerland | 63.73% |
| Georgia | 58.98% |
| Mongolia | 55.49% |
| Haiti | 50.67% |
Egypt’s value above 100% deserves special attention. It does not mean that more than 100% of the currently infected population is simultaneously infected and diagnosed. WHO states that, for chronic HCV, the numerator includes people whose infection later resolved through cure or natural clearance, reflecting historical testing effort, while the denominator is an estimated total infection population. Because the numerator is cumulative and the denominator is estimated under a different population framework, a reported value can exceed 100%. Preserving the source value is more accurate than arbitrarily clipping it to 100%.
For the same reason, values near 100% are better read as very high accumulated diagnosis coverage rather than as exact point-in-time shares of people currently viraemic. The most stable comparisons in this dataset are the broad differences between the large below-20% group and the much smaller group above 40% or 60%, not the ordering of countries separated by a few tenths of a percentage point.
Several 2024 observations are below 1%
At the low end, the Democratic Republic of the Congo is 0.02%, the United Republic of Tanzania 0.03%, Maldives 0.04%, Kyrgyzstan 0.05%, Uganda 0.08%, Ecuador 0.11%, Sri Lanka 0.13% and Ghana 0.18%. Burundi is 0.36%, Benin and Burkina Faso are both 0.38%, Cuba 0.39%, Cayman Islands 0.42%, South Africa 0.48% and Azerbaijan 0.50%. These values identify low reported diagnosis coverage in this indicator, but they do not reveal the cause on their own.
| Country or area | 2024 HCV diagnosis coverage |
|---|---|
| Democratic Republic of the Congo | 0.02% |
| United Republic of Tanzania | 0.03% |
| Maldives | 0.04% |
| Kyrgyzstan | 0.05% |
| Uganda | 0.08% |
| Ecuador | 0.11% |
| Sri Lanka | 0.13% |
| Ghana | 0.18% |
| Burundi | 0.36% |
| South Africa | 0.48% |
A low value should not automatically be translated into a single claim such as “there is almost no testing” or “the health system is failing.” National surveillance completeness, laboratory reporting, registry deduplication, the estimated size of the infection denominator, programme coverage and the timing of updates can all affect the reported indicator. The map is useful for identifying where reported diagnosis coverage is low or high and where deeper country-specific research is warranted. It is not, by itself, a causal evaluation of hepatitis policy.
Selected 2024 country values span almost the full distribution
The Republic of Korea is at 38.26% in 2024, above the 97-observation median. Brazil is 41.78%, Pakistan 29.73%, Bangladesh 27.30%, Morocco 25.07%, Malaysia 22.24% and the Philippines 21.02%. Viet Nam is 13.88%, Ethiopia 7.60%, Nigeria 3.79%, Mexico 1.33%, Indonesia 1.06% and South Africa 0.48%. Even among large or widely discussed countries, the diagnosis coverage values do not converge on one range.
These percentages do not rank countries by the absolute number of people diagnosed. A country with a very large HCV population can have a moderate percentage and still represent many diagnosed people, while a small country can reach a similar percentage with far fewer people. The 100-row extract also does not contain a retained observation for every major country. A gray country on the map is therefore missing from this extract; it must never be interpreted as 0% diagnosis coverage.
The latest-value map mixes three observations from earlier years
The year alignment is strong but not perfect. Ninety-seven of the 100 latest retained observations are dated 2024. Australia is 27.66% in 2023, Canada is 40.35% in 2021 and Japan is 88.36% in 2019. The map hatches those three countries so that readers can see that their colors refer to older latest observations. They are excluded from the 2024 median, mean, grouped distribution and ranking tables.
This separation prevents a common error in international health comparisons. A latest-value map answers “what is the most recent value available for each place?” while a same-year table answers “how do places compare at one reference time?” Both views are useful, but they are not interchangeable. Japan’s 2019 value, for example, should not be inserted into a 2024 ranking without clearly disclosing the five-year timing difference.
Diagnosis coverage and treatment linkage answer different questions
The hepatitis C care cascade has at least two separate coverage questions: how many infected people have been diagnosed, and how many diagnosed people move into treatment. High treatment among the diagnosed group can coexist with low population diagnosis coverage if many infections remain unidentified. Conversely, broader diagnosis can enlarge the diagnosed population and reveal a larger treatment-linkage challenge. A country should therefore not be labelled successful or unsuccessful from either percentage in isolation.
WHO tracks diagnosis and treatment separately because both stages are needed for elimination. Hepatitis C does not have an effective vaccine, but antiviral therapy can cure infection. Finding hidden infections, confirming viraemia and then connecting diagnosed people to treatment are distinct operational tasks. This article focuses only on the first measurable transition: how much of the estimated HCV infection burden has been diagnosed under the WHO definition.
The geographic pattern is descriptive rather than causal
Some higher values appear in the Middle East, Europe and parts of Central Asia, while lower values are visible across parts of Sub-Saharan Africa, Southeast Asia and Latin America. Yet the within-region differences are large. Rwanda is at 71.73% while Tanzania is 0.03%. Switzerland is 63.73%, but Europe is not uniformly high. Saudi Arabia is 67.73% while Qatar is 34.21%. A continent or WHO-region label is therefore too coarse to explain the national pattern.
It would also be inappropriate to attribute the pattern directly to income, health spending, testing prices or one policy without additional evidence. A causal analysis would need compatible same-year explanatory variables and country programme data. This dataset measures diagnosis coverage, not the independent contribution of every possible driver. The map is best used to locate large reported gaps, identify unusual outliers and decide where more detailed country-level investigation is needed.
Data source and calculation method
The statistical source is the WHO Global Health Observatory indicator HEPATITIS_HCV_DIAGNOSIS_PERINFECTED_CRD_PER100. Country observations are available through the WHO GHO OData API. The definition, numerator, denominator, rationale and source notes are documented in the WHO indicator metadata. The unit is percent, and one latest preferred non-disaggregated observation is retained for each country or area.
The latest-value map uses all 100 retained rows and hatches Australia, Canada and Japan because their latest years are not 2024. The median of 12.04%, unweighted mean of 18.23%, grouped counts and ranking tables use only the 97 rows dated 2024. Missing values are never replaced with zero, and the 101.82% source value for Egypt is not capped. ISO-3 codes are joined to a low-resolution world boundary layer, so small places such as Andorra, Maldives, Cayman Islands and Cook Islands can remain in the statistics even when they are difficult or impossible to see as separate polygons at this map scale.
Small decimal differences should not be overinterpreted. International surveillance and model-based indicators carry differences in reporting completeness, estimation and update cycles. The clearest signal here is the broad distribution: 68 of 97 same-year observations are below 20%, while only seven are at 60% or above. The map is a country-comparison tool, not medical advice and not a substitute for individual HCV testing or clinical evaluation.
Frequently Asked Questions
What does hepatitis C diagnosis coverage measure?
It measures the share of the estimated HCV infection population that has been diagnosed under the WHO definition, using evidence such as HCV RNA or HCV core antigen. People previously diagnosed and later cured or naturally cleared can remain in the numerator.
Why is Egypt above 100% in the 2024 data?
The source reports 101.82%. WHO explains that the HCV numerator can include people diagnosed historically and later cured or naturally cleared, while the denominator is an estimated infection population. Those different cumulative and estimated components can produce a value above 100%.
Do gray countries on the map have 0% diagnosis coverage?
No. Gray means that no retained observation for that country is present in this 100-row extract. Missing values are not converted to zero.
Does high diagnosis coverage mean high treatment coverage?
Not necessarily. Diagnosis coverage and treatment among people diagnosed are different stages of the HCV care cascade and should be evaluated with separate indicators.
Related Articles
These Green Map Insight pages provide additional examples of country-level health and living-condition data. Their denominators and source systems are different, so the percentages should not be combined into a single health score.
- Tanzania 2022 TDHS-MIS Guide – Demographic, Health and Malaria Survey
- Global Clean Cooking Access Map – 2023 Country Comparison
- Rural Basic Drinking Water Access Map – Latest Country Data
Green Map creates custom-edited map images using open geographic data sources such as geoBoundaries, Natural Earth, OpenStreetMap, and government open data.
These maps are edited visual materials, not raw data files, and are provided for education, documents, presentations, and graphic reference.
