RICHMOND, Va. β Malik Lawson has been fighting sickle cell disease since birth, but his mother Melinda Lawson says she's raised him to understand that everyone has something to overcome.
"Everyone has something, and with him, he has sickle cell," Melinda Lawson said.
The 20-year-old's battle with the painful inherited blood disease requires vigilance from his family, including knowing his medication routine and recognizing his triggers.
"If you're waiting for the bus and the bus is late and it's cold outside, you can't stay outside like the rest of the kids," Melinda Lawson said.
Sickle cell disease affects the shape of blood cells. While most people have circular blood cells, those with sickle cell have cells shaped like a sickle, making it difficult for the cells to pass through tiny blood vessels and causing excruciating pain.
"It felt like shards of glass trying to pass through your veins. That's what it feels like to have a crisis," Melinda Lawson said.
Melinda Lawson is part of FACTS - Finding a Cure Together for Sickle Cell, an organization dedicated to spreading awareness about the disease that affects 100,000 people in the United States and primarily impacts African Americans.
According to the Virginia Department of Health, one in 325 African Americans are living with sickle cell disease in the Commonwealth, while one in 12 have the trait.
"You can only get it if both of your parents have the trait. Knowing whether or not you have the trait is really, really important. That is the way we're going to reduce the numbers," Melinda Lawson said.
State Delegate Delores McQuinn, who has sickle cell trait herself, has been leading the fight at the Virginia State Capitol. She helped pass House Bill 2500 this year, which converted a fellowship into an endowment, providing more money for research.
"That bill helps to raise the awareness it certainly with in terms of legislators, make them much more aware those who are in the African American community as well as it's bipartisan bill," McQuinn (D-Richmond) said.
Both McQuinn and Melinda Lawson will join sickle cell warriors and supporters for the third annual Florence Neal Cooper Smith Sickle Cell 5K walk, named after the woman known as the mother of sickle cell in Virginia.
"She was fighting this fight before I was born. She's still fighting this fight," Melinda Lawson said.
All newborns in Virginia are screened for sickle cell disease thanks to Cooper Smith's efforts. A professorship in her honor was the first of its kind to be named for a Black woman in the United States.
"But the work that Florence Neal Cooper Smith did was absolutely phenomenal," McQuinn said.
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