Sickle Cell Disease in Sub-Saharan Africa

Abstract

In Africa, at least 240,000 children are born each year with sickle cell disease. Historically, in the absence of newborn screening and appropriate treatment, most such children died undiagnosed in early childhood. However, with increasing awareness of the condition and economic and epidemiologic transition, increasing numbers are surviving. Greater investments in basic and applied research in the African context, and increased sensitization or African ministries of health regarding the importance of this condition, could make a substantial difference to the lives and livelihoods of millions of people living with sickle cell disease on the continent and their families.

Keywords: Bacteremia; Children; Public health; Sickle cell disease; Sub-Saharan Africa.

Figure 1. The global distribution of sickle cell anemia

Cartogram showing the global distribution of SCD SS, with the size of countries scaled to the number of annual births. Reproduced from Piel, FB et al, Plos Med 2013; 10(7): e1001484.

Figure 2. Number of publications per year mentioning sickle for the world and for Africa

Graph shows the number of papers published per year detected by a search PubMed search under the terms “sickle” (global papers) and “sickle AND Africa” (papers from Africa). The numbers returned are maximum estimates as they also include papers on sickle cell trait.