Home grown support for Fight for Sight

Keen gardener and Fight for Sight supporter, Graham Mitchell, has raised £1,000 for Fight for Sight through plant sales held in his garden. Graham, who is registered blind, has supported Fight for Sight since treatment at Moorfields Eye Hospital helped to save his central vision.

Graham, who is affected by the degenerative eye condition retinitis pigmentosa, is keen to support research into new treatments: “After receiving treatment at Moorfields Eye Hospital that saved my central vision I am pleased to be able to do something in return. Fight for Sight is funding vital research into new treatments for eye conditions and I am happy that I can help to fund this research. I am very grateful to everyone who has supported me by buying the plants.”

Graham and his son David have grown over 5000 plants throughout the year. Sales to family members and Graham’s friends at the Guilford Centre for Blind People, where Graham has been learning Braille, have raised over £500 for Fight for Sight.

The fundraising total was given a boost by the sale of hand crafted Christmas cards made by Graham’s friend, 95-year-old Mrs Coe. David’s employer, British Gas, has also agreed to match fund the amount raised, bringing the total to £1,000.

Annu Mayor, Director of Fundraising, is delighted Graham has chosen to support Fight for Sight again this year: “For the last few years Graham and his family have worked hard growing and selling plants in aid of Fight for Sight. We are so grateful for their ongoing support and their dedication to raising funds for vital research into the prevention and treatment of blindness and eye disease.”

For more information call Louise Elliott at Fight for Sight
020 7929 7755 or visit our website: www.fightforsight.org.uk

Note for Editors:
Fight for Sight is the UK’s leading charity dedicated to funding world-class research into the prevention and treatment of blindness and eye disease.

Since 1965, the charity has funded millions of pounds worth of research at leading universities and hospitals throughout the UK. Our major achievements in this time include:
• saving the sight of thousands of  premature babies through understanding and controlling levels of oxygen delivery;
• restoring sight by establishing the UK Corneal Transplant Service enabling over 45,000 corneal transplants to take place;
• revolutionising the treatment for children with amblyopia (lazy eye);
• bringing hope to children with inherited eye disease by helping fund the team responsible for the world’s first gene therapy clinical trial; and
• providing £1million for the research unit at the dedicated children’s eye centre at Moorfields Eye Hospital.

Fight for Sight’s current research programme of over £5 million focuses on preventing and treating age-related macular degeneration, diabetic retinopathy, glaucoma and cataract as well as causes of childhood blindness.