Bears support the Red Alert Appeal for Cure Leukaemia and BBC WM

• 22/02/2012

Bears players recently played their part in Cure Leukaemia’s successful world record breaking attempt to gather the largest number of people dressed as nurses in one particular place.

Ashley Giles and several members of the Bears squad joined more than 200 people who dressed as nurses to mark the launch of Cure Leukaemia’s partnership with BBC WM 95.6, which aims to create more funding for the charity to employ more of its lifesaving research nurses.

These nurses administer lifesaving drugs to leukaemia patients that they would not normally receive through the NHS, and each nurse costs from £25,000 pounds each year to employ. The campaign with BBC WM is aimed to pay for more nurses to be based at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham, Birmingham Children’s Hospital, Sandwell and West Birmingham Hospital, Birmingham Heartlands and New Cross in Wolverhampton.

The Bears have been working with Cure Leukaemia for several years and raised £75,000 at last summer’s Test Match between England and India though a fundraising initiative, which also turned the Eric Hollies Stand to a sea of red. James McLaughlin, Commercial Director at Warwickshire, is also joining the charity in the coming weeks as its new Chief Executive.

To date the charity has helped to treat more than 400 patients by securing £17m worth of revolutionary drugs through the funding of crucial research nurses to administer the treatments.