Over the past 2 years, Welfare Aid has been sponsoring iron chelation therapy for children with thalassemia in Iraq.

With regular transfusions and altered red cell physiology, children with thalassemia are prone to life-threatening iron overload states. Medications that bind iron (iron chelators ) are needed to reduce iron levels to healthy levels and avoid chronic complications of iron overload.

Unfortunately, medications for iron chelation are very expensive and not funded by the public medical system in Iraq. 

Welfare Aid has thus far funded therapy for several children in Iraq but many more children are in dire need of this therapy.