Press Conference to discuss SEPLAA's Position Paper on Compulsory Blood Screening

Launch of the Health Awareness Drive

‘Save a life, save a generation’

                                                               On 10^th February, 2010     

                                                  

SEPLAA’S Position Paper  on Compulsory Blood Screening

February, 2010:

• We urge the people of Pakistan to acknowledge the health risks involved with inter- marriages. The highest numbers of people at risk to transfer a hereditary or contagious disease in Pakistan are people in the NWFP.

• At least 10 per cent of Pakistan's population or one in every ten persons is a thalassemia minor carrier.

• At this estimated rate, the number of thalassemia cases will be doubled to over 200,000 in the next 10 years.

• There are 5,000 to 6,000 thalassemia babies born every year.

• The estimated birth rate of thalassemia-affected children is 1.3 per 1,000 live births.

• Pakistan has more than 1,50,000 thalassemia major cases.
   The national exchequer incurs an expenditure of approximately Rs 130,000 per thalassemic child annually.

• These are only estimated numbers, the actual numbers (including the unreported cases, the deaths following birth and the cases involving other blood disorders such as enzyme deficiencies) are much higher.
  
  
• We need to educate people in the urban cities first that getting one’s blood screened for thalassemia traits or HIV and Hepatitis C is not a matter of ‘shame’ but of ‘social responsibility’.

• We urge the provincial governments to allocate a separate budget for compulsory blood screening of all men and women at the time of the making of the National Identity cards in order to control the increase in the cases of thalassemia, Hepatitis C and HIV.