[advertise]广告[/advertise]CHINA will soon stop mandatory hepatitis B tests for people applying for jobs or admission to schools, the Health Ministry said yesterday, after years of efforts by civic groups to fight discrimination against carriers of the liver disease. Hepatitis B is endemic in China, with an estimated 120 million sufferers. Currently, students applying for schools and jobseekers are usually required to undergo health checks that include tests for the disease. People are sometimes denied positions even though the disease cannot be transmitted by casual contact. Ministry spokesman Mao Qun’an said a soon-to-be-released government policy will strike hepatitis B off such standard health checks, and prohibit other restrictions or limits on hepatitis B carriers from education and work, acknowledging that many still face unfair treatment. “According to experts, society’s misunderstanding of hepatitis B virus carriers is mainly due to the lack of knowledge about hepatitis B,” Mao said. He pointed out that hepatitis B is transmitted by blood, sexual contact or from a mother to a child. “Daily work, study or day-to-day contact will not lead to the spread of hepatitis B.”