12 Days of Gratitude

‘Tis the season to reflect and look back on the year! So, we’re doing 12 days of gratitude this Christmas to share our mahi and the incredible support we received in 2023.

Each day leading up to Christmas, on our social media, we will highlight a part of our organisation, work or support we’ve had or achieved this year. Check out our Facebook page HERE or Instagram HERE to see our 12 Days of Gratitude.

Ultimately, this all comes down to you, our supporter. We couldn’t do what we do without YOU.

Day 1 of 12 Days of Gratitude: Starting with a bang – our generous donor, ANZ New Zealand, has showcased our charity in a beautiful video with one of our community ambassador and bowel cancer patient, Tamsyn Cornwall and our nurse, Victoria.

Day 2 of 12 Days of Gratitude: Our annual Never Too Young awareness month reached hundreds of thousands of people across Aotearoa. From medical centre brochures to social media ads, we successfully reached a large proportion of the under-50 population of New Zealand.

Day 3 of 12 days of Gratitude: This year, we established two new research partnerships to fund our fight against bowel cancer. We are proud to contribute funding to the Malaghan Institute of Medical Research and K9 Medical Detection NZ.

Day 4 of 12 days of Gratitude: This year, we launched ‘Get Off Your Butt’, our new awareness campaign focused on educating people about bowel cancer symptoms.

Day 5 of 12 days of Gratitude: It is essential we create and share information about preventing bowel cancer with the public and health professionals around Aotearoa. We continued this year to reach diverse groups to encourage the conversation around bowel cancer in our communities.

Day 6 of 12 days of Gratitude: A massive shout out to our INCREDIBLE fundraisers for the year. Thank you to all of you wonderful donors for making what we do possible. From shaving their hair off to moving their butts or making a donation, we are so honoured to have your support.

Day 7 of 12 days of Gratitude: This year, we continued to lobby for the nationwide bowel screening age to be lowered and for new bowel cancer drugs to be urgently funded. 

During a political debate, National Party Leader Christopher Luxon committed to bringing the bowel screening age down, matching Australia if elected. We will continue to hold the Prime Minister to his commitment.

We also continued to advocate for more testing and drug funding for this beatable disease. We joined the My Life Matters campaign alongside other patient advocate organisations in the pursuit of equitable access to medicines.

Day 8 of 12 days of Gratitude: We are so grateful for the volunteers who sacrificed their time this year and showed up for Bowel Cancer NZ this year across the motu. You are the backbone of the charity. We also want to give a huge thank you to our community ambassadors, who continue to use their powerful voices to drive awareness of bowel cancer.

Day 9 of 12 days of Gratitude: We are so proud of our team for continuing to achieve our mission of combating bowel cancer on every front. Next year, we will continue to aim to lead the world with solutions to reduce New Zealand’s bowel cancer statistics and free future generations from the impact of bowel cancer.

Day 10 of 12 days of Gratitude: A special thank you to the well-known Kiwis who share our values and have a personal connection to our cause that motivates them to do all they can to raise awareness of bowel cancer.

Day 11 of 12 days of Gratitude: This year, we developed multiple new resources, including a Never Too Young brochure, and updated several current brochures and booklets. Ngā mihi nui to our medical advisors who worked with us to create accurate and helpful resources about bowel cancer for New Zealanders.

Day 12 of 12 days of Gratitude: Meri Kirihimete from all of us at Bowel Cancer NZ. We couldn’t have done this without your support. See you next year!