Viral Hepatitis and Immigrants in Italy

The political changes and instability in the global scenario, especially that of Eastern Europe and the Middle East, led to inevitable consequences in terms of social and demographic. Scenarios of war, poverty and famine push every day large numbers of people to leave their homeland in the hope of finding better living conditions. Italy, the main entry point of the European continent, recorded with Greece the largest influx of immigrants in recent years. Most of them come from North Africa, the Middle East and Eastern Europe (Figure 1). Although many migrants look to the beautiful country exclusively as a transit point for northern Europe, between 1995 and 2012, Italy recorded an increase of migrants on their territory, with the percentage varying from 1.8 % to 8% of the total Italian population [1]. These figures do not include irregular migrants, are about 20% of the total, who do not have a valid residence permit and are not registered in official statistics, therefore most likely underestimate the total population of migrants. Because of the socio-economic Italian, they are the regions of the north and center to be most affected by migration, particularly the Emilia Romagna and Lombardy.