Fight for Sight raises over £58,000 through its Carrots NightWalk

Media Contact: Lizzie Webster
Telephone: 0207 264 3904
Email address: lizzie@fightforsight.org.uk

Fight for Sight raises over £58,000 through its Carrots NightWalk

Fight for Sight, the UK’s leading charity dedicated to funding pioneering research to prevent sight loss and treat eye disease, has raised over £58,000 with its inaugural Carrots NightWalk.

Almost 200 participants completed the charity’s 15 mile walk across London, which took place during the night of 23 September 2011, raising vital funds to help reduce sight loss in adults and children.
Julian Jackson, Director of Development and Marketing at Fight for Sight, said: “Our first ever Carrots NightWalk has been a tremendous success, and will allow Fight for Sight to do even more to help make sight loss a thing of the past.

“1.8 million people in the UK are currently living with sight loss  and as the population ages, the number of those affected is expected to soar . Through the incredible fundraising efforts of our wonderful walkers and supporters, we will be able to continue to bring hope to millions of people living with visual impairment.”

 For more information about Fight for Sight’s fundraising events, please visit www.fightforsight.org.uk/fundraising, email jo@fightforsight.org.uk or call 0207 264 3900.

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Notes to Editors:
1. For more information, please contact Lizzie Webster, Media and Communications Officer at Fight for Sight on 0207 264 3904 or at liize@fightforsight.org.uk
2. Fight for Sight is the leading UK charity dedicated to funding pioneering research to prevent sight loss and treat eye disease.
3. Fight for Sight is funding research at leading universities and hospitals throughout the UK. Major achievements to date 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 48,000 corneal transplants to take place
• providing the funding for the research leading to the world’s first clinical trial for choroideremia
• bringing hope to children with inherited eye disease by helping to fund the team responsible for the world’s first gene therapy clinical trial
• identifying new genes responsible for keratoconus and Nance-Horan syndrome
4. Fight for Sight’s current research programme is focusing on preventing and treating age-related macular degeneration, diabetic retinopathy, glaucoma and cataract. We are also funding research into the causes of childhood blindness and a large number of rare eye diseases.