Hepatitis C Support Group
Hepatitis C is a blood-borne viral disease which can cause liver inflammation, fibrosis, cirrhosis and liver cancer. The hepatitis C virus (HCV) is spread by blood-to-blood contact with an infected person's blood. Many people with HCV infection have no symptoms and are unaware of the need to seek treatment. Hepatitis C infects an estimated 150-200 million people worldwide.
I almost never read short stories, but I was in the mood for some light, escapist reading so I got the O Henry Prize anthology for 2013. One of the stories is about a woman dying from Hep C! "Lay My Head" by L. Annette Binder, originally published in Fairy Tale Review. She doesn't mention it by name, just that the heroine is sick and dying, but she talks about her failed inteferon/riba tx, and the mother calls it "the devil's virus." It's mostly about the process of letting go and dying. The writer doesn't seem to know much about HCV. The character is under 40, got it from the boyfriend/husband she lived with for ten years, three of those years with both of them sick. Even assuming she got it during their dating, she went from infection to death in 15 years at most. My sense is the author just wanted to use something more original than cancer. I'm curious what everyone else thinks, if you read it.
Also, I'm not a short story fan in general, so it's hard for me to judge quality. Often the language isn't as compressed or interesting as poetry, but the plot can't develop like a novel. "Not fish, not meat" as my ESL students used to say.