Today, Monday, the Palestinian Ministry of Health stated that the number of hemophilia patients in Palestine reached 562, including 178 patients in the Gaza Strip , and 384 patients in the West Bank .

This came in a statement on the occasion of the International Day for Hemophilia and Hemophilia, which the world celebrates on the seventeenth of April every year.

This day comes under the slogan "Access to Treatment for All - Prevention of Bleeding as a Global Standard of Care", highlighting patients' suffering and needs and raising the level of community awareness about hemophilia.

The ministry said: “Hemophilia (blood thinning) is a bleeding disorder that prevents blood from clotting properly, as people with hemophilia bleed for a longer period than normal people, because their blood does not contain enough blood clotting factors, and clotting factors are proteins in Blood helps control bleeding, and it is a rare disease that affects one person in 10,000 people worldwide, and it is a genetic disease that is transmitted from a parent to a child through genes.

She added, "There are two types of hemophilia, hemophilia A, which is the most common, and people with it have a deficiency in clotting factor VIII and hemophilia B, and people with it have a deficiency in clotting factor IX."

She explained that people with hemophilia suffer from external or internal bleeding in the joints and muscles, and recurring bleeding causes complications in the musculoskeletal system and disabilities.

The Ministry stated that the treatment for a hemophilia patient is to replace the lost clotting factor in the blood to stop bleeding by giving factor concentrates that contain intense amounts of factor VIII and factor IX (factor), and when immediate treatment and the appropriate amount of treatment and specialized care are available, people with hemophilia can live. perfectly healthy life.

And she continued: "Through projects funded by donors and the World Federation of Hemophilia, patients are provided with the necessary medicines, improving access to comprehensive treatment and care, and improving services, with a focus on home and preventive treatment to control and prevent recurring bleeding episodes so that joint disabilities do not occur."

The Ministry of Health, through the National Committee for Hemophilia Patients, is implementing several projects, the most important of which are: the PACT project with the World Federation of Hemophilia Patients, the HEMOPAL project with the Italian Ministry of Health and the Italian Agency for Development Cooperation, the home treatment training project and equipping the hemophilia center in Gaza, the establishment of the national registry for hemophilia patients And the provision of treatments (clotting factors) worth $3 million. The Ministry received the first and second batches at the ports, and the third batch is awaiting the entry of the second batch.

In addition, a specialized clinic for hemophilia patients was established to conduct periodic medical examinations for all patients to improve their health status, in addition to holding training courses for all laboratory technicians in the Ministry of Health with experts from outside Palestine.