FED: Cancer charity warns against emotive chain letter

AAP General News (Australia)
04-23-1999
FED: Cancer charity warns against emotive chain letter

By Rada Rouse, National Medical Correspondent

BRISBANE, April 23 AAP - A cancer charity has warned against responding to a chain letter
doing the rounds in Australia which seeks business cards for a terminally ill British boy
trying to get into the Guiness Book of Records.

The Queensland Cancer Fund said people trying to help the boy were victims of an "urban
myth" as he had achieved his ambition in attaining the record, survived the illness and was
now grown up.

The fund's executive director, Graeme Brien, said people acting on the letter, which asks
for a copy to be sent to 10 friends, were unintentionally doing harm.

An address in Surrey, UK, has been regularly deluged with mail since 1989 news reports that
Craig Shergold, a seven-old boy diagnosed with a brain tumour, wanted to get into the Guiness
Book of Records for receiving the most greeting cards.

The cancer fund tracked down the truth, confirming with the editor of the Surrey Advertiser
newspaper recently that the latest version of the letter - which asks for business cards or
"with compliments" slips - was false.

"The boy's wish was fulfilled in 1990 after receiving 16 million cards and the tumour was
successfully removed a year later by Dr Neal Kassell of the University of Virginia Health
Sciences Centre," Mr Brien said.

"Unfortunately the cards and letters continue in several versions wrongly claiming that the
young boy remains terminally ill."

The letters encourage people to gather cards and send them to Craig Johns, Jones or
Shergold at an address either in Georgia, USA, or in Surrey.

"Cancer is an emotive cause and an area of great need and we cannot afford to waste any
energy in the fight against it," Mr Brien said.

Sophia Kevans, media officer for the Royal Australian College of Surgeons, was among
members of the Australian Medical Writers' Association thinking they were doing the right
thing by passing the letters to colleagues.

"I'm really surprised to hear it's not genuine: it's either a sick hoax or something which
has just got out of hand over the years because there's so many of the letters out there," she
said.

AAP rr/it

KEYWORD: LETTER

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