We will go ‘One Million Miles’

People in Bedfordshire are being asked to walk, swim, run, row, cycle, roller-skate or even dance to generate their miles!

The One Million Miles challenge will raise funds towards a new Children’s A&E and a dedicated state-of-the-art Computerised Tomography (CT) scanner for the recently extended and upgraded A&E department at Bedford Hospital.

Work is already underway on the paediatric addition to the existing A&E. The new CT scanner will be located within A&E immediately adjacent to the adult and children resuscitation areas and will enable a much faster diagnosis using state-of-the-art equipment.

Indeed, around 20 patients per day, both adults and children, who attend A&E currently require urgent CT scans within an hour of arrival and some within 30 minutes. This new CT scanner will allow a much better standard of care and assessment of these patients and all as swiftly as possible.

Businessman Ismail Anilmis DL is leading the One Million Miles campaign which will feed into the overall £1 Million A&E Appeal for these new additions to the A&E department.

“We want to do something that is accessible to everyone, while helping them keep active,” said Ismail, whose multi-franchise McDonalds restaurant group has raised thousands of pounds for charities over the past decade.

People can register to join the challenge here www.onemillionmiles.co.uk/#register and in return they will get a welcome pack which will include one of the branded reusable water bottles. Once registered, people can set up a fund-raising page via www.onemillionmiles.co.uk

Those taking part could be a parent or grandparent pushing a pram, dog-walking or perhaps even ‘mother and toddler’ groups, schools, teenagers who walk to school rather than going by mum’s taxi or people walking the golf course.

Those planning to take part in any of the local or national marathons could add both the miles from their practice runs and their actual marathon miles! All contributions will be gratefully received – everyone can help and know they are supporting our local hospital and the life-saving services it provides to children and adults alike.

The One Million Miles campaign will be heavily promoted on social media to encourage people to post their own photos as they raise cash for the charity. So that we can follow your activity, it would be great if you could use #OneMillionMiles when posting on social media. Thank you! This campaign will be at no cost to the charity.  The campaign is now launched and will run until the end of the year. We look forward to getting to know you and seeing your photos during this campaign! 

The overall £1 Million A&E Appeal will be taking donations from various other sources including events planned for 2022.

Some of the reusable water bottles have already been donated to the extended NHS by Ismail and Ann-Marie, his wife, of I&A Restaurants. They have been given to the vaccination and volunteer teams at the vaccination centres, in Bedford Borough and Central Bedfordshire, to save on the waste of plastic bottles.

None of us know when we will need the support of our caring A&E staff – hopefully, not soon, but we can all take comfort in the knowledge that we helped make it a better facility for everyone in our “hour of need.”