UNLESS you've had a similar experience, it's impossible to imagine the horror that's visited Ruby Adams and her family since Christmas.

Her fianc, Ellis Curran, was "perfectly fit and healthy", then he died unexpectedly from a heart condition one morning in late January.

The vast majority of us have a cavalier attitude to our health, if we're honest. It's only something we regard as important when it's threatened.

The 'it won't happen to me' attitude is reinforced by statistics which tell the story of 200 youngsters dying in Britain every year from Sudden Death Syndrome. 'Only' four a week.

But those figures hide a more alarming truth - that one in 500 of us suffer from Hypertrophic Cardiomyopathy, an enlargement or swelling of the heart muscle.

And, even if it doesn't kill us, we can pass it on to our children.

It means that Ruby Adams' grief has been magnified by the fear that the couple's two sons may have followed their dad.

That's why she's making sure they have a scan soon. Early diagnosis and drugs can control the condition.

Apart from taking those steps, she's also urging other potential victims to seek medical advice too.

"I feel I need to do something - to jump up and down and scream, and warn people," she says. It's understandable why.

If we'd written this opinion column six months ago, prompted by an earlier tragedy, she and Ellis would probably have read it and moved on.

Now, even if you didn't know him, allow her the comfort of a legacy in her bereavement.

Make his tragic story your reason to find out whether, without knowing, you're among the one in 500.

"Ellis was perfectly happy. He wasn't stressed or ill," Ruby explains in today's Evening News. "He'd just been promoted at work. He had everything to live for."

Enough said.