The ‘Holidays for Healthcare’ charitable initiative is appealing to islanders to donate the value of their £100 ‘shop local’ vouchers to the charitable initiative set up to raise funds for Jersey Healthcare Heroes.
A local fundraising site, set up to raise money for Jersey’s healthcare heroes in the wake of the COVID 19 pandemic, has recently received a welcome and unexpected boost, with a large donation from a young Jersey girl.
Nine year old Amélie decided that this year she would like to raise money as a “thank you” to people “helping to keep things going” during lockdown. She asked for money instead of presents for her birthday and donated half of the money to the charity.
In addition to donations, Amélie invited her friends and family to sponsor her as she completed her challenge. Her original plan was to run, walk and cycle 26 miles over her birthday weekend, but as she had to factor in only doing 2 hours outside the home each day, she broke the distance up and walked or cycled for as far as she could before completing the days target by running around a measured circuit in her garden.
Amélie was surprised and delighted to raise a massive £1000. She had originally planned to donate the funds to the Bailiff’s Fund, but on learning that the money would not go the ‘people’ she decided to instead donate to Holidays for Healthcare, so that people would benefit from a proper thank you gift after all their hard work during the Pandemic in Jersey.
Richard Thomas, Business Development Director at Santander International, set up the donation facility on Race-Nation with the intention of helping the frontline Healthcare workers once this is all over.
The donation site is a separate initiative from the Bailiff’s COVID-19 Fund, which has been set up to raise money specifically for PPE. The initiative and site received the backing and support of the Bailiff and several government departments. The governance arrangements will be overseen by the Health and Community Services Department in the same way that they manage all charitable donations.
Donations currently stand at over £8000 and can still be made online here at RaceNation.
