The Thalassemia International Federation: A Global Public Health Paradigm

Abstract

Many international organizations are struggling today to coordinate limited economic and human resources in support of governments' efforts to advance public health around the world. The United Nations and the World Health Organization, along with others play a pivotal role in this global effort. Furthermore, during the past few decades an increasingly higher percentage of global efforts on public health are carried out by specific health initiatives, international projects and non-governmental patient-oriented organizations. The Thalassemia International Federation (TIF) is one such organization focusing on the control of thalassemia around the world. The current paper aims at presenting a comprehensive overview of the mission, goals, objectives and activities of this organization. Our ultimate goal is to highlight TIF's public health paradigm and diffuse its success at an international levels for others to follow. TIF is devoted to disseminating information, knowledge, experience and best practices around the world to empower patients with thalassemia and their relatives, support health professionals providing care to such patients and promote national and international policies, which secure equal access to quality care for all patients with thalassemia.

Population Screening for Hemoglobinopathies

“…This goal was further endorsed at the WHO and Thalassaemia International Federation meeting in November 2007 (169). The Thalassaemia International Federation has been playing an important advocacy role in promoting population screening for hemoglobinopathies, and details of its work have been published (138). In 2014, a European expert group, after studying the impact of hemoglobinopathies in Europe, published 10 policy recommendations for the region, including increasing awareness of and screening for hemoglobinopathies (94).…”