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Spaulding AC, Miller LS. Lancet Infect Dis 2016; http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S1473-3099(16)30002-0

In this COMMENT, there is a dated picture of a group of relaxed-looking young people listening to a guitarist; it has always been considered that the 'high seroprevalence of hepatitis C virus among baby boomers (can be attributed) to the risky individual behaviour of the Woodstock generation in the late 1960s.' In the substantive paper, (Lancet Infect Dis 2016; 16: 698–702) an alternative explanation is proposed. Just as the cause of the high prevalence of hepatitis C in Egypt was the unintended consequence of employing multi-use needles when administering intravenous tartar emetic for schistosomiasis, it is suggested that unsafe medical injection practices and blood transfusions were linked with hepatitis C in the US. This association was made from modelling phylogenetic analysis of genotype 1a sequences, before and after the 1960s. Although the medical establishment should accept blame for hepatitis C among the baby boomers, these commentators argue that those with hepatitis C from 'Generation Y' will be further stigmatised.