There are about 120 million HBV carriers in China, and about 30 million of them have chronic hepatitis B. So how scary is chronic hepatitis B? Technically speaking chronic hepatitis B is not as scary as we think it is. In terms of the development of chronic hepatitis B, most people with chronic hepatitis B will gradually get better as they get older. About 2% of chronic hepatitis B patients heal on their own each year (about 17% in the 10th year), 8% to 10% of E antigen-positive chronic hepatitis B patients stabilize (up to 51% in the 10th year), and nearly 70% of patients stabilize after 20 years. Of course, compared to healthy people, patients with chronic hepatitis B are still at considerable risk. The risk is that 1 to 2 percent of patients will die each year from severe hepatitis, cirrhosis or primary liver cancer, and over 20 years, about 30 percent of all patients with chronic hepatitis B will die from diseases related to chronic hepatitis B (severe hepatitis, cirrhosis or primary liver cancer), and some patients will need to be hospitalized because of hepatitis activity. Therefore, patients with chronic hepatitis B need to be treated promptly, and the aim of treatment is to reduce hepatitis activity and to reduce the incidence of heavy hepatitis, cirrhosis or primary liver cancer, to maintain a good quality of life and to extend life expectancy.