What Is Hepatitis A, the Virus Now Linked to a New Jersey Starbucks?

Prevention, in a story also posted to Yahoo! Life, spoke with Thomas Russo, professor and chief of infectious disease in the Jacobs School, for background on reports that customers who visited a New Jersey Starbucks between early- to mid-November may have been exposed to hepatitis A. Starbucks says a former employee tested positive for the highly contagious virus. Hepatitis A is a short-term liver infection caused by the hepatitis A virus. Russo said people who get hepatitis A may feel sick for a few weeks or several months, but usually recover without lasting liver damage. “While most people do get better, there’s a very small subset that may develop more severe [liver] disease and, rarely, [liver] failure.”