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Focus on preventing thalassemia

Staff Reporter

NEW DELHI: India has an estimated 4 crore thalassemic carriers, which means one out of every 25 Indians is a carrier of this deadly disease.

Also, an estimate 10,000 children are born with this deadly disease every year. About 80-90 per cent of these thalassemic infants die either undiagnosed or because of lack of proper treatment.

In its effort to fight this disorder, Dr. Lal Path Labs is now conducting a "Thalassemia Fortnight" in association with Thalassemics India that concludes this Tuesday.

Said Arvind Lal of Dr. Lal Path Labs: "Thalassemia is a fairly prevalent disease in India, with Northern India contributing a large number of silent carriers and patients. Severe forms of thalassemia cannot be treated with any type of dietary supplements or medicine; the disease has to be prevented and not cured."

Ignorance about the disease is likely to lead to increasing numbers of thalassemia gene carriers or "minors", who on marrying each other are likely to result in 25 per cent chance of giving birth to a thalassemia major baby, which is avoidable.

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