Tackling Leukaemia Inc. kicked a number of goals over the weekend, successfully registering 130 new donors to the Australian Bone Marrow Donor Registry.
On Saturday Tackling Leukaemia held their first inaugural Rugby 10s Football competition with the aim of having at least five players from each club nominate to get their swabs taken. Not only did they achieve that - they doubled it.
Tacking Leukaemia chief executive Kevin Maloney, notes the day was a huge success and achieved what they set out to do.
"We had three goals; get as many Pasifika and First Nations people together at once, achieve a minimum of five donors per team, which we doubled, and get higher level publicity by way of press and esteemed attendees."
Results can be found on the Box Hill Rugby Union FC Facebook Page.
In attendance were notable names such as Dr Monique Ryan MP, Alan Latu from Rugby Victoria, Blood Stem Cell Registry chief executive Lisa Smith, and Dr Michelle Ananda-Rajah MP.
"Australia has a very small pool of blood stem cell donors which we urgently need to increase, and more particularly we need to have donors from a range of backgrounds," said Ms Smith.
With blood cancer rates among young First Nations and Pasifika people rising, Tackling Leukaemia has been targeting grassroots sporting communities to bring awareness to the effects of leukaemia and increasing sign-ups to the Australian Bone Marrow Donor Registry (ABMDR) with their 'Strength to Give' program.
The program was initially launched through the registry to make it more accessible by using mouth swabs, like in overseas models but that has since ended resulting in Tackling Leukaemia covering most of the recent costs.
"Swabs have always been the way to go for Pasifika and First Nations people, they hate needles and I can understand it," Mr Maloney said.
"Mouth swabs are not invasive, they can do it themselves, stick it in the envelope and it's done."
One million dollars in government funding was recently committed to the task of adding more donors to the registry but just half of those funds were allocated to the ABMDR, with the other half going to Red Cross. As such, Tackling Leukaemia will be able to process, at most, 5,000 donors while the disparity of First Nations and Pasikifas on the donor registry will require approximately 125,000 new donors.
In an incident illustrating the importance of adequate and timely funding, recently people attempting to register online to receive their swab-kits have found the website down, with a notice stating it's "coming soon!!".
"We've got this movement happening as a result of the 10s and this great publicity, and we've a lot of guys that want to respond but can't because the webpage for signing up is down," said Mr Maloney.
