Box 1. Chronic-hepatitis B (CHB) diagnosis, and applied inclusion, non-inclusion and exclusion criteria.

	Cases	Controls
CHB diagnosis	.Viral activity: assessed through a DNA-hepatitis B virus test. .Analysis: COBAS® TaqMan® HIV-1 analyser. .Virological exam: done 3 to 4 months before the patient inclusion in the study in order to determine the viral load 33.	-
Recruitment method	.Patients followed at the outpatient clinic infectious diseases	.Caregivers of patients with a chronic-hepatitis B .Relatives of persons involved in the study .An advertisement to recruit healthy participants will be launched via the personal Facebook account of the 1st author
Inclusion criteria	.Age: 30 to 50 years .Chronic-hepatitis B (CHB) diagnosed with a surface antigen persisting for at least 6 months before inclusion in the study .AgHBe positive or negative with a viral load > 2000 IU/ml 33 .No comorbidities .No co-infection with other viruses .No liver damage .No indication of treatment [fibroscan score 0-6, and/or score at the liver biopsy puncture (activity and fibrosis) <2] .No physical/mechanical problem	.Age: 30 to 50 years .Healthy participant .No chronic diseases .No physical/mechanical problem .No alcohol intake
Non-inclusion criteria	.6-min-walk-test contraindications 32: signs of unstable angina or myocardial infarction during the previous month, resting heart-rate≥ 120 bpm, systolic-blood-pressure≥ 180 mmHg, diastolic-blood-pressure≥ 100 mmHg .History of orthopaedics/rheumatologic conditions which may interfere with the walking or handgrip-strength .Systemic impairment which may influence blood test results (eg; diabetes-mellitus or renal-failure)
Exclusion criteria	.Loss of certain biological data .Incomplete performance of the 6-min-walk-test and/or spirometric test