Leire Solís, health policy and advocacy manager at IPOPI, was invited to present IPOPI’s perspective on newborn screening for severe combined immunodeficiency (SCID) at the International Society for Neonatal Screening regional meeting between October 14-17, 2018, in Bratislava, Slovakia. Ms Solis’ intervention was part of the session dedicated to SCID newborn screening, showing that more countries around the world are considering, studying or already screening for SCID, either at national level or regionally.
Representatives from New Zealand, the Netherlands or Norway shared their experiences with SCID NBS as well as the challenges they overcame when setting up the screening process and the clinical follow-up of the patients that test positive for SCID.

Countries where SCID newborn screening has been recommended but funding or final approval are still lacking are: Denmark, Switzerland (also in charge of the analysis of screening tests from newborns in Liechtenstein), the UK, Germany and most probably Slovakia.

IPOPI continues to advocate for the implementation of SCID newborn screening in European countries and beyond and is currently involved in several campaigns. Important steps have recently been taken in Europe and it is our aim to help ensure additional countries besides Norway and Iceland will soon start screening for SCID!

For more information on SCID NBS please email leire@ipopi.org