Dubai: Thalassaemia cases in Dubai have plummeted, according to a government health expert.

Dubai Health Authority’s Thalassaemia Centre, which used to get between 14 and 18 cases of the blood disorder each year, has had just one a year, sometimes none, for the last four years.

The centre’s director, Dr Khawla Belhoul, attributed the drastic reduction in numbers to the extensive medical and educational awareness campaigns and the premarital screening law introduced in the UAE in 2006.

“Since 2007, we began exhaustive community outreach and awareness activities, which has directly resulted in reducing the number of thalassaemia cases in the emirate. We conducted awareness activities and invited various groups to visit the Thalassaemia Centre as part of the outreach programme,” she said

Last year, 54 schools, two universities and 11 government departments visited the centre as part of the awareness campaigns. The centre also held five awareness activities across malls in Dubai, eight awareness activities across government institutions and two campaigns in universities.

She said students choose to be tested to find out whether they carry the disease, and that this was important to do early in life so that carriers could take future decisions carefully.

Dr Belhoul said thalassaemia is a recessive genetic disease, meaning both parents must carry the gene to pass it along. When that is the case, with each pregnancy there is a 25 per cent chance that a child will be born with the disease, a 50 per cent chance the child will only be a carrier and a 25 per cent chance the child will not be affected.

She cautioned potential marriage partners about being vigilant in prevention of the condition: “Our message is clear — it is unadvisable for both partners with thalassaemia to get married because there are strong changes that all the babies born to that couple will carry the disease and we see several such cases. However, if only one person has thalassaemia it is still OK because the baby will be a carrier but will not have thalassaemia.”