A Fife couple whose 26-year-old son died suddenly two years ago have thrown their weight behind a campaign to raise awareness of Sudden Adult Death Syndrome.

Maggie and Andrew Tait, of Glenrothes are supporting a bid by Fife MEP Catherine Stihler to have the shocking condition officially recognised by the World Health Organisation.

Only then, they say, will it be properly researched and lives could be saved.

The Tait’s son, Andy, died in February 2001, after collapsing with chest pains and a racing heart at this Kirkcaldy home.

He had been a fit young policeman with a promising career ahead of him and enjoyed playing football and golf and often went running.

His death was officially recorded as heart failure but his devastated parents were unable to understand how their apparently healthy, athletic son could just collapse and die.

“He had never had any illnesses in his life but we later found out eight young people die every week in the UK of heart-related problems.” Said Andrew, a former sergeant with Fife Police’s traffic department.

“These deaths seem to affect young, athletic people and when we saw how many people actually died of this we realised there was obviously a problem.”

Andrew and Maggie found their statistics on a website set up by the organisation Cardiac Risk in the Young (CRY) and through them they met the families of other young people who died in similar circumstances to Andy, something they found helpful.

In hindsight, they realise there were signs something was wrong with Andy.  Despite his fitness he was often unable to play a full 90 minutes of football and became breathless easily.

Maggie hailed the awareness campaign as extremely important and said she hoped it would prevent deaths in the same way as the cot death campaign had in babies.

CRY is raising money to set up mobile screening units across the country, although there is not one in Fife at the moment and the Tait’s feel it is important that all young people are given an echocardiogram (ECG).

A recent screening programme in the Western Isles saw 400 children tested with heart defects picked up in 15 of them.

Maggie said, “It costs £34 to test each child, which is nothing.  If every surgery had an ECG machine perhaps it would save lives.”

CRY put the couple in touch with Catherine Stihler, Labour’s health spokeswoman in the European parliament, who launched her campaign in Brussels earlier this week.

“I am calling on the World Health Organisation to officially recognise and name sudden death syndrome,” said the MEP.

“Since cot deaths were officially recognised as Sudden Infant Death Syndrome, deaths have fallen by 70% in a 10-year period.

“The death of 26-year-old Andy Tait, a policeman and fit and talented footballer here in Fife, is a vivid reminder that this syndrome can affect anyone, even those who seem most healthy in our community.”