Winneba, July 13, GNA - A District Co-ordinator of the National Council on Women and Development (NCWD), Madam Mercy Appiah-Emissah, has advised prospective marriage partners to strive to check their sickle cell status first before entering into full marriage contract.

This, Mad. Appiah-Emissah said would save them from the numerous problems the disease posed, "if prospective couples allow the power of love to blind them into marrying wrong partners as far as the sickle cells diseases is concerned, then it is unfortunate".

The NCWD Co-ordinator was addressing the 27th Annual Conference of the Central Region branch of the Ahmadiyya Muslim Women's Association at Winneba on Saturday.

The theme for the conference attended by both national and regional leaders of the Association, was: "Women, the Bedrock of the Society". Mad. Appiah-Emissah who spoke on "Sickle Cell Disease and its Implications," outlined a number of health problems that the disease could bring to people who were suffering from it.

These she said included kidney, blood blockage in the lever, infertility in men and stroke.

She said to avoid disappointments in marriage lives, it would be proper and more advisable for would-be marriage partners to first go for thorough medical check-ups to ascertain their blood levels before finalising such partnership deals.

Mad. Appiah-Emissah said even though the disease had no cure, sickle cell patients could live longer if they diligently adhered to instructions given them by medical experts.

Other speakers at the conference stressed the importance of girl child education and charged Muslims to ensure that their female children were offered good education to enable them to become useful mothers and nation builders in future.

They should also adhere strictly to the use of the right dresses Muslim women were bound by the Islamic tenets to wear to maintain their dignity all the time.