Drew Simmons, almost 5, looks and acts like a normal American boy, with a touch of Dennis the Menace.
But Drew and his brother David, 7½, have hemophilia.
In an effort to promote student participation in the TCC blood drive in November, Drew and his mother Gail visited classes and talked about the disease and their experiences. Gail talked; Drew chiefly just messed around.
On this particular day, Drew was on crutches, the result of an incident the night before. Their parents urge them to be careful, but both boys play most of the time like the other fellows, and sometimes they get hurt.
Hemophilia is a tendency to uncontrollable bleeding, the inability of the blood to clot, leading to difficulty in controlling hemorrhage even after minor injuries. That’s why the boys have to be careful.
There are three types of hemophilia – mild, moderate, and severe — and both Drew and David are severe.
Women don’t suffer from hemophilia, but they can be carriers, and transmit the X chromosome from mother to son. A woman who is a carrier has a 50-50 chance to have a normal son and a 50-50 chance to have a daughter who is a carrier. After David was born, Mrs. Simmons was told she was not a carrier, but it later turned out that she was.
Treatment of the hemophiliac is costly, but most important, says Mrs. Simmons, is having the blood and its blood-clotting factor available. The miracle drug which makes this possible, she said, has been available for 13 years. From each pint of donated blood, only a teaspoonful of clotting factor is extracted.
That’s why she and Drew take on speaking engagements, to encourage people to donate blood in special drives or at Four States Blood Services on College Drive. The blood from the TCC drive went to a hemophilia pool, and Drew benefited, getting two free units from each pint contributed in his name. Donors can go to the Four States Blood Services any time, give blood, and say, “It’s for Drew.”