Relay for Life raises $148,141

By Tina Comeau

THE VANGUARD

NovaNewsNow.com

Yarmouth County’s annual Relay for Life was held overnight at the Hebron Recreation Complex June 6-7.

This year’s event raised $148,141.78 for the Canadian Cancer Society.

The event, which involved 71 teams – representing just over 700 participants – sees at least one member from each team continuously doing laps of a track throughout the night, representing the fact that cancer never sleeps.

At the completition of the event, people were encouraged to fight back against cancer and to pledge to save at least one life in the coming year, whether it be by having themselves checked out for detection of the disease, encouraging someone else to do the same, by urging government to commit more funding and resources to research and by caring for someone who is battling cancer.

This year’s Relay for Life included over 235 cancer survivors. There were also 2,750 luminaries sold in memory of someone who died of cancer and in honour of those still fighting it.

This year’s top fundraising team was the Sobeys Stars, which raised $7,580.04.

Area residents Rhonda Flemming and Annette Surette were the top individual fundraisers, each having raised around $1,100.

Putting on the relay is no small undertaking. More than 150 volunteers were involved in this year’s effort.