MSPs warned over illness

Major failings exist in the diagnosis and treatment of a condition which causes vitamin deficiency in about 109,000 people, MSPs have been warned.

Campaigner Andrea McArthur said pernicious anaemia, the most common cause of vitamin B12 deficiency, is a “forgotten illness” and that treatment for it is “consistently bad”.

Mrs McArthur appeared before Holyrood’s public petitions committee yesterday, calling for an overhaul in the way the condition is diagnosed and treated.

She told MSPs that she had never been diagnosed with pernicious anaemia even though she believed she suffered with it for 13 years.