Fabrice Muamba says Brighton midfielder Enock Mwepu must remember the "bigger picture" after being forced to retire.

Zambia's Mwepu, 24, ended his playing career earlier this week because of a hereditary heart condition.

The Premier League club said playing on would have carried an "extremely high risk" of endangering Mwepu's life.

Muamba, whose own career ended after he suffered a cardiac arrest while playing for Bolton in 2012, is relieved that experts detected the issue.

"He's allowed to feel like his career has been taken away from him at such a young age," ex-England Under-21 midfielder Muamba, 34, told BBC Sport.

"At the same time, his loved ones need him around now. It would have been a lot worse if something bad had happened to him during a game of football."

Doctors diagnosed Mwepu's condition after he was taken to hospital on a recent trip to Mali with the Zambia national squad.

"At that particular moment, you feel like this thing has been stolen away from you without you having a say in it," said Muamba, who has launched an initiative to teach cardiopulmonary resuscitation via messaging app Snapchat.

"But at the same time, you've got to look at the bigger picture - this is not about you any more. This is about everybody who's involved in a football club, it's about the players who you're playing with."