Jamie Mulgrew and David Healy are pictured showing their support for a campaign by the family of Eimear Smyth to increase the awareness and importance of Stem Cell donations and below is a statement from Eimear’s father Sean Smyth.
Linfield FC have have joined up with the family of Eimear Smyth, to help them raise Stem Cell Donor Awareness in Northern Ireland. Eimear died on June 27, 2019, from complications of a donor stem cell transplant. Following Eimear’s death the family started to campaign to raise stem cell donor awareness in Northern Ireland and encourage people to register as Stem Cell donors and help create Hope for people in desperate need of a life-saving Stem cell transplant.
Every 20 minutes in the UK someone is diagnosed with a blood cancer or blood disorder and for some patients their only chance of survival is stem cell transplant. With only a 30% chance of finding a match from a family member, most will be reliant on a complete stranger having joined a register like
https://www.anthonynolan.org and
https://www.dkms.org.uk
Every year 33 people from Northern Ireland need to find a non related stem cell donor to have any chance of survival. Fundamentally, the more donors we can get on board, the more hope we can create. And we are reaching out to you, and the wider sporting community, to ask for your help in our mission to find a lifesaving donor for every patient facing transplant.
Eimear’s dad Seán said, We approached The Irish Premier League teams simoky because donors between the ages of 16 & 30 provide the best possible long-term outcomes for patients. We also particularly want to reach out to young men in this age group as they are more likely to be chosen to go on and donate but are significantly underrepresented on the register. There are many myths out there about what is involved in donating stem cells but, for 9 out of 10 donors, it involves a very simple out-patient procedure similar to giving blood – it really could be that simple to create Hope for someone with a life threatening illness.
With your position at the heart of the community and your audience of young people, and particularly young men, we hope you can see the amazing opportunity to work together to raise awareness of the need for donors and dispel some of the myths surrounding donation. There are likely to be many potential lifesavers amongst your supporters, we just need the opportunity to show them how.
We are always looking for opportunities to work with partners to amplify our message and save more lives. This may be by using your communication channels to spread the word, identifying an opportunity to host a donor recruitment information event.
I am sure that the amazing support given by Linfield FC, will create Hope for people with life threatening illness and that is something pretty amazing. By working together we are giving young people, regardless of academic achievements, social status or sporting prowess the ability to create Hope.
Please watch Up-close. It’s very moving but positive and tells Eimear’s story.https://www.itv.com/utvprogrammes/articles/up-close-eimears-wish
Eimear’s wish can be contacted at:
eimearswish@outlook.com or call 07450678785
