Health: Asian/Americans confront hepatitis B, the 'silent killer'

Journalist Alan Wang is featured in "Be About It."

ALAN WANG, former a television journalist in the San Francisco Bay Area and from outward appearances, is living the good life.

"I don't want for too much," he tells a reporter from the San Jose Mercury News. "There are only a few things you've got: your health and your family and the love around you. I've really learned to appreciate that." 

In a Sunday feature article about a documentary, "Be About It," he told the reporter that he suffers from Hepatitis B.

One in 10 Asian/Americans is chronically infected with Hepatitis B, and San Francisco has the highest rate of liver cancer in the world, according to figures from San Francisco Hep B Free.

There are several reasons hepatitis B is known as "the silent killer," the article states. "First, it often doesn't produce symptoms in people for decades, so people aren't aware they've got it until it has progressed significantly, says Huy Trinh, a San Jose hepatologist, or liver specialist. In the meantime, the disease progresses, and people transmit it unwittingly."

"The majority of patients are not aware they have the infection," Trinh says. "Their perception is that they must have significant symptoms to have the virus."

The film, which has been making the rounds of film festivals, including the CAAMFest film festival in San Francisco in March and will be shown later this month in the Los Angeles Asian Pacific Film Festival, aims "to break the silence" about a disease that disproportionately impacts people from East Asia and Asian/Americans. It is the story of two fathers who have contracted the disease. 

A.J. Jabanero competed in triathalons.

Besides Wang, the other father featured in the documentary is A.J. Jabonero, who died from the disease about a year ago. 

Up until late 2014, Jabonero seemed to be doing amazingly well. He began to devote himself to eating well and competing in triathlons, especially after he became the father of his first two children, now 7 and 3, says his wife Melissa. 

But he was inconsistent in taking his medication, she says.

Often stigmatized and misunderstood, Hep B is the most common cause of liver cancer among Asian Americans. 

Wang left the television station where he worked last March 31. According to his LinkIn bio, he is now a spokesperson for Weber Shandwick/Gilead Sciences, which is helping promote "Be About It."

The executive director of the documentary is Paul Kiely and it was directed by Christopher Wong, who was also a co-producer along with Zebediah Smith. "Be About It" will be shown in the Los Angeles Asian Pacific Film Festival, April 22 at the Downtown Independent theater. 

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