title: [Prevention of mediterranean anemia in Latium: Ida Bianco archives].
abstract: Mediterranean anemia or beta-thalassemia is a hereditary syndrome characterized by a severe defect in haemoglobin production and an altered morphology of red blood cells. Homozygous condition for beta-thalassemia is characterized by short survival. Heterozygous condition is clinically found in adolescence and is characterized by a less aggressive phenotype. Ida Bianco, with her husband Ezio Silvestroni, has conducted a long struggle for beta-thalassemia prevention in Italy. They were the first to draw up an accurate map of the distribution of thalassemia in Italy and to conceive and implement a campaign against this genetic disease by the development of annual screening on at-school teenagers and pre-marriage prevention. Here we focused on the analysis of Ida Bianco's archives concerning screenings conducted on middle-schools in the Latium by the "Centro Studi della Microcitemia" of Rome from 1975 up to today. The results of the thirty-years prevention work in the Latium will be described.
authors.affiliation: Dipartimento di Medicina Sperimentale, Università "La Sapienza", Roma, I.
authors.forename: Mario
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Falchetti
authors.forename: Ramona
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Lupi
authors.forename: Laura
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Ottini
mesh_terms: D001109:Archives; D049673:History, 20th Century; D006801:Humans; D008403:Mass Screening / Q000266:history; D010641:Phenotype; D012384:Rome; D012574:Schools / Q000266:history; D017086:beta-Thalassemia / Q000235:genetics / Q000266:history* / Q000517:prevention & control