Treating injecting drug users for hepatitis C can be a catalyst for breaking their addiction or avoiding the sharing of injecting equipment, a study suggests.

Researchers followed 190 patients at 25 sites, including seven in Australia, who had injected drugs in the past six months or were currently in an opioid agonist treatment program when they started direct-acting antiviral (DAA) treatment.

They found that for every follow-up appointment, to a maximum of 10 over a two-year period, the odds of each patient having injected drugs in the previous month fell by 4% and the odds of having shared injecting equipment fell by 13%.

“These findings are encouraging, given that sharing behaviours are the main driver of hepatitis C virus reinfection among people who inject drugs,” the researchers wrote.