In celebration of the International Thalassaemia Day 2021, the Thalassaemia International Federation (TIF) proudly presents a High-level Event for the Official Premiere of the Federation’s Global Thalassaemia Review, to take place on 8 May.
WHO Director General, Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, will open the event with a welcome speech addressed to the global thalassaemia community, whilst high-ranking representatives of national governments, international patient organizations, prominent academics and many other internationally renowned figures operating in the haemoglobinopathies field, will also be participating.
Among the participants to highlight national success stories in the prevention and management of thalassaemia will be Mr Vassilis Kikilias, Minister of Health, Greece, Mr Constantinos Ioannou, Minister of Health, Cyprus, His Highness Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan bin Khalifa Al Nahyan, United Arab Emirates, Mrs Mouna Haraoui, Founder & President of the Board of Trustees of the Chronic Care Center, Lebanon, Mrs Fatemeh Hashemi, TIF Board Member, President of the Charity Foundation for Special Diseases, Iran and Prof. Maria Domenica Cappellini, Professor of Haematology, Italy.
The event will be moderated by acclaimed Euronews journalist, Mr Damon Embling.
The event will be broadcasted on TIF’s Facebook on 8 May – 12:00 Athens / 11:00 Paris / 10:00 London / 05:00 New York
Global Thalassaemia Review: What TIF Knows on the Global Status of Thalassaemia
The Global Thalassaemia Review is TIF’s first attempt to encapsulate the knowledge gained through hundreds of delegation visits in more than 70 countries globally and thousands of hours of work in the field of thalassaemia. It is also a particularly ambitious and demanding project that needed more than three years to be completed.
This 506-page review brings together for the first time a huge volume of information and evidence-based data from all over the world with regard to this disorder, touching upon the areas of Epidemiology, Prevention, Clinical Management, Blood Safety, Cost of Illness and Social Health Protection. It constitutes perhaps the most substantial work of the last decades on thalassaemia, and TIF aspires for it to be a work of reference for national governments, the academic and scientific communities and, of course, patient advocates all over the world.
The TIF Global Thalassaemia Review 2021 Publication will be available for download on the TIF website, after the completion of the High-level Event.
International Thalassaemia Day and Global Thalassaemia Review
Celebrated on the 8th of May since 1994, the International Thalassaemia Day is devoted to raising awareness amongst the general public and decision-makers about thalassaemia, promoting and strengthening the lifelong and difficult struggle of patients against this severe blood disease, and commemorating all the people who are no longer with us, while renewing our promise to keep fighting until the final cure for thalassaemia is found.
This year’s International Thalassaemia Day is dedicated to “Addressing Health Inequalities Across the Global Thalassaemia Community”, in an effort to shed light onto the substantial need for a greater focus on addressing and reducing both existing and emerging inequalities and heterogeneity in provided healthcare and services, which is nowadays even further accentuated by the coronavirus pandemic. The selected theme is aligned with the findings of the Global Thalassaemia Review, from which emerges a picture of significant disease burden and unmet needs for our patients.
