COMEDIAN Lenny Henry will be in Newport next month for a charity ball at the Hilton Hotel.

The TV funnyman, patron of the Sickle Cell Society, will be at the Sickle Cell Ball at the hotel in Langstone on Friday, February 3.

Paula Burns, of Newport-based PAB Events, which is organising the evening, said: "Lenny Henry's attendance will be an important step forward in raising the profile of sickle cell anaemia in Wales.

"The response to this event has been overwhelming and the tickets sold out within three weeks."

Deputy mayor of Newport Roger Jeavons will also be attending the ball. There are an estimated 12,500 people in the UK with the blood disorder, which affects haemoglobin, the oxygen-carrying substance found in red blood cells.

It causes those cells to change to a half-moon shape and can be extremely painful for the sufferer.