PM wanted to help me

Jun 3 2008

We are following the heart-rending story of journalist Adrian Sudbury, 26, who has only weeks to live because of leukaemia. He is dedicating his last days to highlighting the need for more bone marrow donors.

Here's an except from his online blog.

MEETING with Gordon Brown was a great experience.

In the UK Mr Brown is criticised for not as being relaxed in the media as Tony Blair was, but one to one he is really approachable, good company and listened to everything I had to say.

I am still quite touched that he spent a good 20 minutes of his time with me, which is a hell of a lot of time for this issue when you have got a country to run.

Later that day it was reported he was meeting with other OPEC leaders to discuss ways of reducing world oil prices and yet there he was chatting to this guy from Sheffield with a suit and daft hat on. Mr Brown even suggested taking it a step further and seeing if we could get a video campaign to support it.

He asked me to suggest a couple of celebrities I thought would be good to front it and that he would personally write to them on my behalf.

Don't get me wrong, Mr Brown is a skilled politician with a towering intellect. Nothing was committed to during that chat, but I left the meeting feeling like he really wanted to help and that some sort of lasting change is going to take place.

I have to add for the record that I am not brave.

Loads of people keep saying that to me but I'm not dodging bullets in Afghanistan, losing my child, challenging difficult children or keeping our streets safe. All I've ever done is get ill and write about it.

That said all these wonderful comments are overwhelming, fantastic to read and often breathtaking. I've had to set my mum on as a full time moderator for my blog. I think she quite likes doing it though.

When I got back to Sheffield after meeting the Prime Minister, my blood counts had really dropped. I had done all this with the equivalent of three bags of blood missing from my body.

That is hardcore.

* There is now a live petition supporting Adrian Sudbury on the Downing St website at http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/ bone-marrow/ The closing date for signatures is July 23.

To find out more about his campaign to find more bone marrow donors, go to www.examiner.co.uk