As the world marked sickle cell day recently, a non-governmental organisation used the opportunity to draw attention to the danger in what it called marriage by emotion in which it is contracted without the necessary checks. ELEOJO IDACHABA writes.
For the family of Mr and Mrs Emmanuel Ohiomokhare, the pains of losing their child to death on account of the debilitating effect of sickle cell anemia is something that should be imagined rather than experienced by anyone. They are, however, coping with the trauma even though the incident happened two years ago. According to the Ohiomokhare, they envisaged a lasting family bond with their son Jephthah, but he was lost to the cold hands of death. Many reasons could be adduced for this situation in which many couples found themselves in. It is for this reason that analysts say young people and would-be parents need to be mindful of their future partners’ genotype, a call that was re-emphasised recently by Dr Tolutope Otele, the medical director of Garnet Care Hospital, Abuja.
Dr Otele made this emphasis at an event to mark the World Sickle Cell day organised by the Jephthah Ohiomokhare’s Sickle Cell Foundation at The Nigeria Army Officers Wives Association (NAOWA) College, Abuja.
Dr Otele who gave a talk on ‘Preventing Sickle Cell and stopping the stigmatisation against sickle cell warriors, says many young people still do not take the issue of genotype testing before marriage seriously as they are usually blinded by emotions. She says many sickle cell births that go on daily are as a result of lack of testing by parents before marriage.
Otele, who is also a part time doctor with Garki Hospital, Abuja, says though there are now cures to the sickle cell disease through stem cell transplant, these treatments, he noted, are not easily accessible and expensive. She urged potential parents to avoid bringing children into the world to suffer pains and sometimes untimely deaths because of their carelessness.
The programme, which also featured a talk on mental wellness by a counsellor, Mrs Sally Easterbrook, also had an essay competition by the senior and junior schools of NAOWA college. With the topic ‘A Future Without Sickle Cell’ the students explored various ways the disease could be prevented and how people could be better enlightened about its dangers.
From the junior category, Duruchukwu Divine favour emerged as the winner of the essay competition carting home a prize money of N60,000 while from the senior category, Best Abalaka emerged winner with a prize sum of N100,000. There were also monetary gifts for the first and second runner ups for the competition.
The founders of the Jephthah Ohiomokhare Sickle Cell Foundation, Emmanuel and Senami Ohiomokhare, both media personalities, said this is the first in the series of essay competitions they hope would become an annual event for schools in Abuja in order to create awareness about sickle cell disease among the students before they start having serious relationships that may lead to marriage. The couple said they chose to start the competition in college because that was the last school their son, Jepthah Aireankhue Ohiomokhare attended before he died two years ago due to complications from the sickness. Blueprint was informed that the day of the event was also chosen because the late Jephthah would have been 18 years old on that day.
The World Sickle Cell Anaemia Day is set aside by the United Nations to create awareness for sickle cell anaemia. It is celebrated worldwide on June 19. The prevalence of sickle cell trait ranges between 10 and 45% in various parts of sub-saharan Africa. In Nigeria, carrier prevalence is about 20-30% while it is estimated that there about six million sufferers in the country.
Also, the day is used to make the people aware of the disease and the proper cure. It is very necessary for people to create a better life without any disease by which they can be able to do lots of things in a better way. Sickle cell disease occurs in children’s when they are newly bon from their mother’s womb. It is quite important to cure the disease before the birth of any child as it is inheritable and can cause problems to the child also.
Governments of many countries have launched many events aimed at removing the pandemic from the world in order to give a better life to the people. Such events include the distribution of the messages and posters, drawing of the pictures, health talks, social media website for message posting, free checkup of the sickle cell anemia disease, marathon, response of the people due to programmes on the TV channels and also on the radio. It is also said that there are lots of themes through which a lot of people can get much of the information about the sickle cell diseases.
Expert advice
According to Professor of Anatomy, Oladapo Ashiru, “For those who are married and are sickle cell carriers, the danger is that they can have a child, who is also a carrier. In this age, there should be no reason why they should bring a child with sickle cell anaemia into the world because there are now technologies available to determine the genetic composition of a baby before the embryo is implanted.
“We now have infrastructures in Nigeria which can allow couples who are sickle cell carriers have a pre-conception determination of their baby to ensure they don’t have a sickle cell baby and we have done that successfully to help a lot of people who are sickle cell carriers to have normal children.”
