A special ‘Ring in for Hannah’ day is being staged by a Teeside newspaper to raise money for a girl who needs surgery on a severe birth mark.

The Northern Echo, and its sister weekly paper the Darlington and Stockton Times, want to raise £20,000 so that two-year-old Hannah Maxwell-Jones can travel to America to have the mark removed.

Since the appeal was launched, the newspaper has been inundated with cash donations and offers of help.

So now it has designated Thursday, December 21, as a special day for readers to call in and pledge money.

A help desk will be set up and staff will man the phones.

There are also plans to make it possible for readers to donate money through the newspaper’s web site – www.thisisthenortheast.co.uk

Northern Echo editor, Peter Barron, said: “This is a story which has touched hearts all over the region and we want to play our part in helping Hannah to live as normal a life as possible.”

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