ABSTRACT
A report of sickle-cell anaemia in a Ghanaian family dated 1670 exists in the literature. The condition was well known to the African people, particularly in Nigeria where sufferers were called ogbanje — 'children who come and go'. The malevolent ogbanje were the ones who in the past realised that they could not succeed in the world and so decided to die in order to return to heaven but found entry was denied them. So they formed a spirit society, living in the baobab trees, and sometimes decided to be reborn and live with a human family. In the 1850s, Thomas Addison (1793-1860) described a lethal form of anaemia related to a pathological gastric mucosa associated with the absence of acid in the stomach — today this would be referred to as 'pernicious anaemia'. The signs were a macrocytic anaemia, glossitis and neurological symptoms such as paraesthesia and an odd gait.
