PESHAWAR: Hamza Foundation demanded of the government to making premarital thalassemia carrier screening essential to reduce the rate of high-risk marriages and birth of affected children by identifying the asymptomatic carriers. The demand was made in view of the increasing toll of thalassemia-affected children which has surged to 1,436 in the provincial metropolis. According to Hamza Foundation MD Ejaz Ali Khan, the total number of registered thalassemia patients was 1,245, including 128 hemophilia and 63 patients with cancer diseases in the center. He said pregnant women who were asymptomatic carriers of thalassemia should get Chorionic Villus Sampling (CVS) diagnostic test from Rawalpindi in early pregnancy to determine disorders in the fetus, so that the spread of the thalassemia could be contained. APP
