"People said medicine was changing every day and they were working to find a cure.
"But that was a fairytale. Thirty-seven years on, children with CF live a very difficult life. They are in treatment from the minute they are born."
The genetic condition affects more than 10,800 people in the UK. One-in-20 in the Caucasian population carries the gene but there are a number of CF genes which are found only within the Jewish community.
Those with the condition experience a build-up of thick sticky mucus in the lungs, digestive system and other organs, affecting the entire body.
"There was no genetic testing when Benjamin was born," Mrs Angel says. "And we were as far away from a cure when we started as when we finished.
"We have had different treatments around the world but they have cost billions to develop.
"And when I look back, I know that had we put the millions we raised into advising people to get tested as soon as it was available, then people's lives would have not been destroyed."
Despite her son living life to the full, dealing with the day-to-day reality of the condition had been terrifying. "He was my first child and I was very young, 23. I don't think I had ever held a baby before I held him.
"I was nervous. I was taught to do physiotherapy on him and he was on antibiotics from day one. If he got an infection he was taken into hospital and pumped with more serious stuff. He didn't digest any of his food and had to have supplements, which as a baby is very difficult. The enzymes we gave him literally ate his face and created sores all over it."
As time passed, treatments for the condition evolved and Benjamin went to school, having taught himself to read at three.
"He went to Cambridge to study medicine and then came to London UCL. Marriage followed and Benjamin and his bride enjoyed two very happy years.But then something terrible happened," Mrs Angel continues, her voice breaking with emotion. "Within 24 hours he was in intensive care and was put on a ventilator. They told us they expected him to die within the week.
"He was on it for four months and during that time they brought him out of sedation a few times and on one occasion he asked his wife if she was pregnant because they had been trying."
Benjamin surprised doctors by recovering from that infection but a further issue caused his death.
"Our lives will never be the same again. We suffer every single day and I think about him and the life he should have had, the children he should have had. It is not the life we wanted for him."
The Angels, who live in Stanmore, are Jnetics trustees and Mr Angel recently became its chair. They want every Jewish couple to be aware of genetic screening.
"Today we can test for the nine most life-threatening conditions in the community," Mrs Angel says. "Why would anyone not want that?"
