Hard Hats Share Brain Cancer Beanie Message
BY MEREDITH BLAIR
Staff at a Hunter Valley coal mine have raised $10,000 to help the Mark Hughes Foundation (MHF) to continue its fight against brain cancer.
Hunter Valley Operations’ (HVO) general manager, Dave Foster, presented the funds, on behalf of the mine’s staff, to MHF co-founder, Mark Hughes, at a training day at the Singleton Civic Centre last month.
Mr Foster said the money had been raised by staff purchasing hard hats with a specially designed logo.
He said with several members of the HVO workforce having a personal experience with brain cancer, the team wanted to do something practical and visible onsite to support them and others.
“While the HVO workforce have bought MHF beanies, these can’t always be worn on-site, so we came up with the hard hat idea,” Mr Foster said.
Mr Hughes said the money will go towards raising awareness about brain cancer, funding innovative research and providing support to people impacted by brain cancer and their families. He said alarmingly very little is known about brain cancer, its causes or how it can be best treated.
“Support like this helps us to fund research by HMRI and other national researchers, and to keep our nurses in the community to help families when they are in the toughest time of their life,” he said.
“We are hoping the community will consider supporting our work again this year through our Beanies for Brain Cancer campaign, which includes the NRL Beanie for Brain Cancer Round between June 29 and July 2.”
Since Mark and Kirralee Hughes founded MHF in 2013, following Mark’s diagnosis with brain cancer, it has raised more than $24 million. Around 1,200 Australians die from brain cancer each year.
Brain cancer is the leading cause of cancer death in children, and adults aged under 40 in Australia. Survival rates have only increased by one per cent in the past 30 years.