Meet Steven Hobson. He’s a 62-year-old veteran from Bemidji now living in Brainerd. In the mid-70’s he joined the military and was stationed in Germany during the Vietnam War. One early morning while helping on-call in the hepatitis ward his life changed.

After followup tests returned negative for hepatitis Steven continued to live his life any normal person would. He played sports, dated, meet his wife and had two kids. Nothing was uncommon in Steven’s life until he went to get a blood test in 2008 to update his life insurance.

Steve spent six months with his first treatment, which had less than a coin flip chance of working. And after injecting himself weekly and not getting better Steve started to lose hope. But that’s when a new door opened.

Now Hepatitis C free Steven is telling his story to remind everyone to get tested and to give those with the disease hope that they to can be like him and be Hepatitis free.

By — Lakeland PBS

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