Josephine Maseruka
27 October 2009
Kampala — Ugandans living in the city of Dallas in the US are to raise funds for the construction of a sickle cell centre in Uganda.
The over sh1b centre will be constructed at Namalere in Kawanda, Wakiso district.
Sickle cell anaemia is an inherited blood disorder that occurs almost exclusively in black people of African descent. It is characterised by episodic pain in the joints, fever, leg ulcers and jaundice.
In future, the centre will do bone-marrow transplants to cure sickle cell anaemia if we build it to the standard of the American centres, said Capt. Lukiah Mulumba, serving in the US Air Force in Texas.
The funds will be raised through dinners and awareness programmes, she added.
Early next year, a dinner will be sponsored by the Rev. Joseph Kamugisha, the head of Ugandans living in Dallas.
Mulumba made the disclosure during a conference on the plight of sickle cell patients in Uganda at the Nyaritex Conference centre in Dallas.
The occasion coincided with celebrations to mark Uganda's 47th independence anniversary.
Organisers of the event were members of the Keep a Child Informed and Inspired, an NGO that was started by Ugandan parents living in Dallas.
Mulumba was accompanied by Capt. Brezina Laurie and Sgt. Heidi Quigley, all attached to the 859 Medical Wing at Lackland Air Force Base in Texas.
Mulumba's daughter, Marriam, underwent a bone-marrow transplant a year ago, which cured her of sickle cell. The expensive operation is not available in Uganda.
Mulumba heads the Uganda-American Sickle Cell Rescue Fund, an NGO that aims at addressing issues concerning sickle cell patients.
The fund recently bought a van for the Sickle Cell Association in Uganda.
The development of a new centre will supplement the efforts of the ill-equipped unit at Old Mulago Hospital.
Be the first to Write a Comment!
Copyright © 2009 New Vision. All rights reserved. Distributed by AllAfrica Global Media (allAfrica.com). To contact the copyright holder directly for corrections — or for permission to republish or make other authorized use of this material, click here.
AllAfrica aggregates and indexes content from over 125 African news organizations, plus more than 200 other sources, who are responsible for their own reporting and views. Articles and commentaries that identify allAfrica.com as the publisher are produced or commissioned by AllAfrica.
