Story
Thank you for visiting my Justgiving page! This year I have been given the honour to run the London Marathon for Fight for Sight, an incredible charity which is very close to my heart. My inspiration is my amazing & beautiful younger sister Emily who was born with Cone Dystrophy Syndrome, which essentially means she is short sighted, long sighted, colour blind and extremely sensitive to light.
Fight for Sight are the largest eye research charity in the UK, they provide hope for nearly two million people living in the UK with a visual impairment that affects their everyday lives and can even lead to the loss of independence.
I’ve never run a marathon before, and slowly but surely I’m beginning to realise what a long way 26 miles (and 385 yards) actually is. Any support is greatly appreciated, pennies or pounds, likes or shares! Big love to you all X
Donating through JustGiving is simple, fast and totally secure. Your details are safe with JustGiving – they’ll never sell them on or send unwanted emails. Once you donate, they’ll send your money directly to the charity. So it’s the most efficient way to donate – saving time and cutting costs for the charity.
FIGHT FOR SIGHT RESEARCH INFORMATION
Nearly two million people live in the UK with a visual impairment that affects their everyday lives. Living with sight loss means struggling with everyday tasks and can lead to the loss of independence. We are the largest eye research charity in the UK. We receive no government funding and rely entirely on the support of our fundraisers and donors.
We believe all sight loss is not inevitable. It is only through medical research we will make sight loss a thing of the past. Our research programmes are currently developing ways we can better diagnose, prevent and treat eye conditions such as glaucoma, age-related macular degeneration, diabetic eye disease, and childhood blindness. Even rare inherited eye diseases.
Sight loss statistics:
- Every 5 seconds someone in the world goes blind.
- Every day 100 people in the UK start losing their sight, and as the population ages, that number is expected to soar.
- Fifty percent of people have an eye condition or disease for which there is currently no cure – we can change this.
- Almost 70% of registered blind and partially sighted people of working age are not in employment.
- Globally, 285m people are estimated to be visually impaired; 39m are blind and 246m have low vision.
- For adults, sight loss is associated with an increased risk of depression, social isolation and physical trauma through falls.
Some of our achievements have included:
- Key research helping to save the sight of premature babies.
- Establishing the UK Corneal Transplant Service enabling 52,000 corneal transplants to take place.
- Research leading to more effective treatment for children with amblyopia (lazy-eye).
- Funding the research which has led to the world's first clinical trial for choroideremia (an inherited retinal disorder).