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Reporter's bone marrow campaign earns audience with the PM

Huddersfield Daily Examiner reporter and leukaemia sufferer Adrian Sudbury had an audience with the Prime Minister.

The 26-year-old travelled to London to meet Gordon Brown as part of his campaign to raise awareness of the shortage of bone marrow donors in the UK.

Adrian, from Sheffield, revealed last week how he had gone into relapse after leukaemia returned and that he might now only have months to live.

Mr Brown invited Adrian to Downing Street after hearing about his campaign, in what has been a busy few days for the Examiner digital journalist. Adrian also met Health Minister Alan Johnson and Children’s Secretary Ed Balls.

He has also been in heavy demand by the national media, doing interviews for Radio 5, BBC Breakfast and Sky News along with Look North and Calendar – the two Yorkshire regional TV news magazine shows.

To cap off his hectic schedule Adrian enjoyed a chat with cricket legend Sir Ian Botham who is the current president of the Leukaemia Research charity.

Adrian’s campaign was given a double-page spread in The Mirror and has been publicised by the MediaGuardian and a host of Trinity Mirror’s regional titles across the UK.

The Huddersfield Daily Examiner has also launched a ‘Sign up for Sudders’ campaign to publicise Adrian’s bone marrow donor mission.

All this publicity has meant a surge in visitors to Adrian’s Baldy’s Blog, where he has posted a video of his meeting with Gordon Brown.

Steve Harrison, Trinity Mirror’s digital content manager, said the level of interest was unprecedented.

“The number of visitors to the blog is nearly ten times the daily average and we have received a couple of hundred comments in one day alone,” he said.

“We’ve never seen anything like this before – prior to this, the most popular blogs on our sites were all to do with football but Adrian’s blog is getting eight times more traffic.

“It’s a tribute to the power of Adrian’s blog and his ability to touch people from all round the world – it’s become a web phenomenon.”

In November 2006, Adrian was diagnosed with two distinct types of leukaemia running at the same time. According to medical literature, he is the only person in the world to suffer from this condition.

He has chronicled his battle with the disease in Baldy’s Blog which has won several awards.

  • There is now a live petition supporting Adrian’s campaign on the Downing Street website. The closing date for signatures in July 23.