One-year-old, Margot Martini, is battling with an extremely rare form of blood cancer which has dual lineage – both Acute Lymphoblastic Leukaemia (ALL) and Acute Myeloid Leukaemia. A condition so rare that her consultant haematologist has only diagnosed it three times in the last decade.
In October, aged only 14 months, Margot was rushed to Great Ormond Street Children’s Hospital in London, needing an immediate blood transfusion and would spend the next 10 days on a life support machine.
Her parents Vicki and Yasser have made a touching video appealing globally to find their daughter a stem cell donor.
This short clip, posted on the 23rd of December, has already garnered over 30,000 hits and prompted action for many folk online willing to help save this little girl’s life.
Margot’s parents have organised national “donor drives” over several parts of the UK where volunteers can register. The couple live in hope that someone will be the perfect match.
Speaking to Sky News father, Yasser, said: “Margot needs to receive a stem cell donation from someone with a similar tissue type as hers. So we are on a worldwide search for a donor, and unfortunately, without much luck to date.”
Register. Swab. Save a life. It really can be that simple.
Anyone in Ireland wishing to register as stem cell donors are asked to visit http://www.bmdw.org/index.php?id=addr… and select their location to find local donor registration organisations.
According to The Mirror after just one week of launching the campaign, Delete Blood Cancer UK had received more than 12,000 requests for swab kits.
Video via YouTube/Yaser Martini
