NEW ORLEANS (WGNO) – Remember the ice bucket challenge? Everyone was doing it! Even WGNO’s Anne Cutler and Hank Allen participated. But the viral sensation did much more than fill up our news feeds. It helped bring attention to a debilitating disease: ALS.
And just days ago, Eddie Redmayne won an Oscar for his role in the ‘Theory of Everything’, portraying famous Physicist Stephen Hawking – and Hawking’s ongoing battle with ALS.
“It’s just been unbelievable I actually woke up the day after the Oscars thinking, ‘I can`t believe I live in a world, where you`d have to live under a rock to not know what ALS is’ — and it wasn`t like that a few years ago. Maybe only half of the general population knew what ALS was before the Ice Bucket Challenge,’ said Jaime Craig with the ALS Association`s Louisiana-Mississippi Chapter.
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Craig says the challenge did much more than raise awareness. It raised more than $115 million nationwide. $209,000 locally, more than doubling what they made last year, allowing them to hire needed people and reinstate programs that were recently cut. Rodney Frisard of Metairie, who suffers from ALS, says these additional funds have been a godsend.
“I can call anytime and get someone out to my house to help me to do anything. They provide respite care, so when my wife gets ready to throw me against a wall they can send someone in for a couple days to help take care of me…What I want to say is thank you, it`s wonderful for people to star understanding what ALS is about,” said Frisard.
‘Even though it`s a small population that`s affected, it`s a significant population. These people matter. They`re doctors and computer engineers and teachers and artists and athletes. They are people who are a part of our society and their bodies are failing them, but their minds are still there,’ said Craig
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