Valentine’s Day is a special day, no doubt. It’s a celebration of love where usually the most common gift is a bouquet of roses. For children with diabetes in underdeveloped countries, this Valentine’s Day was even more special, all thanks to people who chose to spare one rose from their bouquet and donate the value of that rose to the “Spare a Rose, Save a Child” campaign organized by Diabetes Online Community (DOC) in support of the Life for a Child Program.
The campaign was launched last year and was met with great enthusiasm from the Diabetes Online Community, which raised over $3,000 in only week.
This year, the DOC has set the bar higher, aiming to raise $10,000 for the cause in two weeks leading up to Valentine’s Day. Harnessing the power of social media, the community urged people to tweet using hashtags like #sparearose, post on Facebook and blog in order to raise awareness about the campaign and encourage people to spare a rose for kids with diabetes. As it turns out, all the tweeting, Facebook posting and blogging has paid off: together, people who chose to buy an extra rose raised nearly $20,000, which was double the original target.
Since the launching of the Spare a Rose campaign last year, it has already raised over $22,500 for children with Diabetes in developing countries.
The money raised goes towards providing insulin, test strips and other medical supplies that are critical and necessary to the survival of these children. Recently, the “Life for a Child” program that organized this campaign has signed up 8 more centers in countries like Cambodia, India and St. Lucia. These centers will be joining the existing 35 centers and together they provide life-saving care to 11,200 children. In most of these countries, the Life For a Child program is the only source of insulin. Without it, most of these children have a guaranteed death sentence.
Next time you’re buying flowers for someone special, consider sparing one to save a child’s life. Not only will you make that special someone’s day, but you will be making a huge difference in the life of a child with diabetes.
