There is no effective vaccine against hepatitis C. Prevention therefore depends entirely on interrupting the bloodborne routes of transmission, and on finding and curing infections before they are passed on.
Blocking bloodborne transmission
In health care, prevention rests on safe injection practices and the sterilisation or single use of instruments, together with safe handling and disposal of needles and medical waste, because reused equipment is one of the commonest routes of transmission.
Blood and blood products are screened for HCV before transfusion, which has made transfusion-related transmission rare wherever screening is universal.
For people who inject drugs, harm-reduction services reduce transmission directly. These include needle and syringe exchange programmes, substance-use counselling, and opioid agonist therapy. WHO recommends all of them as part of a public-health response.
Sexual transmission is inefficient, but barrier methods reduce it for people at risk, particularly those with multiple partners or men who have sex with men.
What does not spread hepatitis C
HCV is not spread through breast milk, food, water or casual contact such as hugging, kissing or sharing food and drinks. This matters practically, because it means people with hepatitis C do not need to be isolated from family life.
Testing and treatment as prevention
Because cure removes the source of infection, testing and treatment are themselves preventive. Treating diagnosed infection prevents onward transmission as well as preventing the cirrhosis and liver cancer that chronic infection would eventually cause.