Arcadi Kolchak and Richard So are millennials working to save their generation and others from an epidemic of hepatitis B in the Asian and Pacific Islander community.

Calling Out a Silent Killer

February 11, 2018

Riding a tech bus to Silicon Valley has nothing to do with hepatitis B, but there's a good chance some of the passengers have the virus and don't know it. Why? Major risk factors include being millennial and Asian & Pacific Islander (APIs comprise nearly half of tech jobs and a quarter of the population in the Bay Area). Inaction can lead to death by liver cancer. That's why Arcadi Kolchak and Richard So are fighting to save their generation — and yours.

Evy Schiffman with her husband Neil a few months before he died of lung cancer at 67.

Better Death

February 14, 2016

By Joel P. Engardio -- Baby boomers changed everything because they were never content with the old rules of sex -- or career, or parenting or retirement. Now senior citizens, they are beginning to face a final taboo harder to break than sex ever was. Death has a lot of room for improvement.

David Traylor (left) isn't psychotic, in jail or dead today thanks to Judge Ronald Albers (right) of San Francisco’s Behavioral Health Court.

A Court for the 10th Circle of Hell

December 13, 2015

By Joel P. Engardio -- David Traylor attacked a tourist in a crack-fueled schizophrenic episode. But he isn't psychotic, in jail or dead today thanks to San Francisco's Behavioral Health Court. He is medicated, has a home and a job. Yet homeless and mentally ill people who haven't committed felonies are left to suffer as they scream at commuters and use the sidewalk as a toilet. Why don't we treat people who can't take care of themselves before they become violent?

Jade Ribbon Campaign speech

November 20, 2003

Joel Engardio gives a tribute to his late boyfriend Dr. Mark Lim, who died of liver cancer at age 31 caused by Hepatitis B. The speech is part of an event by Stanford University's Asian Liver Center and Jade Ribbon Campaign to raise awareness of the "Silent Epidemic" of Hepatitis B and liver cancer in the Asian American population. Engardio spoke at the Herbst Theater in San Francisco on November 20, 2003.

Dr. Sam So is the founder of the Asian Liver Center at Stanford University.

The Silent Epidemic

January 3, 2003

A silent epidemic more deadly than HIV -- liver cancer caused by hepatitis B -- threatens to engulf the Bay Area Asian American community.

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