Finley’s mile a day to helps raise money for the Covid-19 appeal

Young Finley Mayes has been making the best use of his time away from school during lockdown to raise money for charity.

For the seven-year-old, who lives in Kedington, has been running a mile a day in aid of the Help Your NHS Hospital Covid-19 appeal.

The appeal is being run by the My WiSH Charity, which supports the work of the West Suffolk Hospital, and is aimed at supporting patients and also the staff at the hospital in Bury St Edmunds during the pandemic.

He said he and his mother Sophie, who works part time as a social worker at the hospital, thought it would be “a helpful job” to raise money to support the NHS after being inspired by the “Clap for Carers” campaign and because staff have been doing a “brilliant job” looking after people with Covid-19.

The Kedington Primary School pupil had an initial target of £100 but exceeded that by raising a total of £385.

Sophie said: “We ran a mile every day during May just before Finley went back to school the middle of this month. When we started doing the ‘Clap for Carers’ that kind of gave us the idea of raising money for the hospital.

“Kedington is quite a small village and we did similar routes each day and ran across the nearby fields and we were so excited to see the total going up and up.”

She praised all the people who supported them and added: “It was also nice to get out and about and get some fresh air and doing something healthy during lockdown.”

And Finley added: “The first few days were fairly easy but it got harder and harder. Some days I had to do it on my own (when his mother was at work) and I then had to run around the front of the house in our little garden area. I was running one day and I tripped over and fell and hurt my knees but I kept going and they are all better now. I just wanted to raise the money for the NHS.”

Sally Daniels, My WiSH appeal manager, said: “Finley did so well to run every day for a month even when he badly scraped his knees. We can’t thank him enough for his determination. The money he raised has already been put to good use to support both the patients and staff and so he really has made a difference”.

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