Marco, for those who don’t know him, is an Italian former soccer player suffering from ALS since 2008. He lives in his hometown, Mantua. Once a tireless sportsman, now he’s unable to move. He lives thanks to artificial ventilation and a tube feeding him. All his mental faculties are intact.
How to show solidarity and love to a friend with an incurable disease, perfectly lucid in a body that doesn’t obey anymore?
That’s what we asked ourselves.
Marco already receives fundamental support and encouragement on social media, and his closest friends help him in more practical ways, but we decided to do something more.
The no-profit organization MARCO S. – NO ALLA SLA has three main objectives:
- Helping ALS patients, and among them Marco, from a financial point of view. Maybe many people aren’t aware of it, but suffering from ALS is a very expensive business : you need to have professional round-the-clock help at home, and people coming to your bedside daily for physical therapy and nursing care, there is expensive material to buy. And, by the way, you still have bills to pay to keep your house. Regional funding covers only a small part of these expenses (and has been cut drastically in 2014).
- Organizing fundraising events to raise consciousness, in Mantua but not only, about this terrible disease and to make Marco feel less alone in a tangible way.
- We also want to contribute to the fight against ALS giving a part of the money raised to other causes, working with other organizations, associations or individuals to became more efficient and make a difference