Good Article about Anemia from the New York Times. From the article:
Thanks to advertisements for the once-popular tonic Geritol, most people of a certain age know about “tired blood,” a disorder more accurately called anemia, involving a shortage of healthy red blood cells to carry oxygen to body tissues and cleanse them of carbon dioxide.
It is not really the blood of people with anemia that is “tired.” Rather, it is anemic people themselves who commonly experience chronic fatigue. Other symptoms may include weakness, shortness of breath, impaired athletic performance, rapid heartbeat, irritability, apathy, dizziness, pale skin, headache and numb or cold hands and feet. But in many people the symptoms are too mild to be recognized, and the anemia goes undetected for years.
Anemia is the most common blood disorder in the United States. Statistics indicate that 3.4 million Americans are anemic, but experts say that this is a gross underestimate and that anemia has been viewed for far too long as an “innocent bystander,” considered almost normal in certain groups, like menstruating women and the elderly.
But a growing body of research indicates that anemia can seriously compromise the quality of a person’s life, make sick people sicker and even speed deaths, said Dr. Allen Nissenson, a nephrologist and professor of medicine at the University of California, Los Angeles.