Deborah James, the 40-year-old British star presenter of a podcast dedicated to cancer, raised more than £4m for research in four days, after revealing she was in palliative care.
Known as “Bowel Babe” on Instagram, she said on Monday she said goodbye to 600,000 subscribers to her channel she’s been telling for months about her daily battle against colorectal cancer.
“This is the message I never wanted to write. We have tried everything but my body is not playing the game,” she wrote, stressing that she did not know how many days left for her to live and calling for continued donations for the research.
On Thursday, she was awarded the honorary title of ‘Dam’ after Queen Elizabeth approved her “relentless campaign” against the disease. And she had set herself the goal of collecting 250 thousand pounds, and collected 16 times on Friday, exceeding the threshold of 4 million pounds (4.7 million euros).
Her message provoked a wave of emotional reactions on social networks, where many Internet users praised the “strength” and “generosity” of this mother of two children aged 14 and 12.
“Deborah is an inspiration”
Depuis son diagnostic en 2016, Deborah James, ancienne directrice adjointe d’école, s’est notamment fait connaître en coprésentant le podcast de la BBC “You, Me And The Big C” (Vous, moi et le cancer), émission très populaire in the UK. She also wrote a book about her illness. “Deborah is an inspiration and her honesty, warmth and courage are a source of strength to so many,” Prime Minister Boris Johnson wrote on Twitter.
Deborah James told her followers that she left hospital to die with her family at her parents’ home in Woking, southwest London.
“It has been a year since I drank alcohol, but the doctors told me: Deborah, you’re dying, drink what you want She said in an interview published Thursday by the Daily Times. “So I poured myself a glass of champagne.”
