 Patients with sickle cell disease often develop painful crisis without any obvious reasons. Some patients are more likely to develop this complication than others. It is now clear that painful crisis only occurs when sickled red blood cells stick to white blood cells that have been activated, usually by inflammation or infections. A recent study in mice with sickle cell disease showed that the use of long term antibiotics could reduce the number of activated white blood cells and reduce death of the mice during sickle cell crisis. 