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BRAZZAVILLE, Republic of Congo (AP) - The wives of African leaders called Tuesday for the global health community to focus on combating sickle-cell disease, an inherited blood disorder particularly prevalent among those of African lineage.
Some 300,000 African children are born each year with the disease and 50 percent of them die before the age of five, said Antoinette Sassou Nguesso, wife of the Republic of Congo President Denis Sassou Nguesso.
"Why is this malady not considered as a public-health priority?" she asked attendees at a symposium on the disease in the capital, Brazzaville.
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