New-born Screening and why it matters
I was recently scrolling through my Twitter newsfeed and I
came across something which genuinely shocked me – a campaign to support
New-born screening in Romania as at the moment there are approximately 30,000
babies which are being unscreened in that country each year. This means that,
potentially, there are babies being born with PKU (not to mention other rare
conditions) who are not only unable to be diagnosed, but are additionally missing out on treatment. PKU is a treatable condition if diagnosed early enough. Otherwise, it can have life
changing consequences.
Before New-born screening was established as a practise in
the early 1960s, babies born with PKU suffered with brain damage as doctors
were unable to diagnose or treat them in time. It
breaks my heart to think that people, like myself, were once unable to live a
healthy lifestyle because we didn’t have the technology or knowledge to treat
the condition. Some of you may even know someone who has been effected by this
(I know I do).
I honestly thought, perhaps naïvely, that we were universally
past this stage. Whilst modern times and technology have indeed allowed us to surpass these
early stages here in the UK, America and in the majority of European countries,
this is not the case in countries such as Romania, China and Haiti.
We have come a long way with advanced technology and in raising awareness of PKU around the world, but there is so much more that still needs to be done.
Follow the link below to read the tweet I found on this:
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