100,000 thank yous as Florence Bark appeal reaches huge milestone

The appeal to pay for life-saving treatment for a Corby girl with leukemia has hit a huge milestone in just five days.

Last night (Wednesday, June 22) the appeal for little Florence Bark, five, reached £100,000 after people from Corby and around the country dug deep in one of the town’s biggest-ever fundraising campaigns.

As of 9am, the total is now sitting at an astonishing £107,000.

Florence has rare acute myeloid leukemia that has left her confined to a hospital ward undergoing her second round of chemotherapy.

She is also due to have a bone marrow transplant in five weeks but that procedure may not work because there is no exact match for Florence on the donor register.

So over the weekend, her parents Andrew, a headteacher at Kingswood Primary, and Stacey, a healthcare assistant at Corby Urgent Care Centre, set up an appeal to raise £500,000 for last-resort Car T-Cell therapy for their girl.

Their story has spread far and wide and has seen local people set up numerous fundraising activities to help pay for the treatment. Many have changed their social media profile pictures to Florence’s orange and yellow rainbow logo and musician Lethal Bizzle recorded a message for her.

And last night, the totaliser topped £100,000 – and rising, thanks to shares high profile celebrities including Al Murray and Nick Knowles.

It’s now the town’s second biggest ever fundraising campaign after it toppled the £100k total raised for Cody Hall in ten months back in 1993.

And in the 1980s it took 13 years to raise £1million for Lakelands Hospice.

Earlier this week, the Northants Telegraph spoke to Florence’s mum Stacey, who is with her daughter who is being treated at the Queen’s Medical Centre. She said: “This fundraising has filled us with a bit of hope and given us something to focus on.

"To raise 20k in less than 12 hours was amazing but we can’t believe it’s just kept going up and up.”

Many local people from Corby and beyond have organised fundraising events to keep the total rising. Corby Town Youth FC U9s team are holding a football tournament to raise cash on Saturday, September 3 at Corby Rugby Club. Anyone interested in taking part can visit the group's Facebook page for more details.

Local artist Alistair Cochrane is auctioning a beautiful painting of the town’s boating lake. You can find out more details here.

If you’re holding a fundraising event for Florence, let us know and we’ll include details in our roundup. You can email [email protected] with details.

How can I help Florence?

You can SHARE details of the campaign using the hashtag #bemorefab as widely as possible so that people across the country see it.

You can SIGN UP here to become a blood stem cell donor if you are OVER 30

You can SIGN UP here to join the stem cell register if you are UNDER 30

You can DONATE here to give directly to Florence’s campaign to raise half a million pounds