Arioua Anis, Shaw David
Institute for Biomedical Ethics, University of Basel, Basel, Switzerland.
Asian J Transfus Sci. 2025 Jan-Jun;19(1):125-129. doi: 10.4103/ajts.ajts_123_23. Epub 2024 Aug 22.
Thalassemia is a genetic blood condition and one of the emerging global public health concerns in the world, with an estimated prevalence of 300,000,000. The genes controlling hemoglobin production are affected, leading to an anemia of variable severity. Carriers of this hereditary anemia are found globally, but a high frequency is observed around the Mediterranean basin, in the Middle East, in the Indian subcontinent, and in Southeast Asia, so called the thalassemia belt. This article aims to review the history and factors of spreading of thalassemia, to identify the burden of the disease on individuals, population, and public health, and the issues that thalassemia patients have experienced during the pandemic of COVID-19. Online literature and previous studies on the disease are used to prepare this article. We identified various factors that have contributed to the spread of thalassemia in the last decades and affected the health condition of individuals and population. The recent worldwide pandemic of COVID-19 worsened the situation and made it more complicated for most patients, especially in the emerging countries.
地中海贫血是一种遗传性血液疾病，也是全球新出现的公共卫生问题之一，估计全球患病率为3亿。控制血红蛋白生成的基因受到影响，导致严重程度不一的贫血。这种遗传性贫血的携带者遍布全球，但在地中海盆地周边、中东、印度次大陆和东南亚等地频率较高，即所谓的地中海贫血带。本文旨在回顾地中海贫血的历史和传播因素，确定该疾病对个人、人群和公共卫生的负担，以及地中海贫血患者在新冠疫情期间所经历的问题。本文利用了关于该疾病的在线文献和以往研究。我们确定了过去几十年中导致地中海贫血传播并影响个人和人群健康状况的各种因素。近期全球范围的新冠疫情使情况恶化，对大多数患者来说，尤其是新兴国家的患者，病情变得更加复杂。
