Brave five-year-old's race against time for potentially life-saving US cancer vaccine

LIKE any mum, Shirley Hepworth proudly points out her daughter’s colourful drawings. There’s one of the Queen, which five-year-old Beau sent to Her Majesty and was delighted to receive an official letter of thanks. And there’s one of New York’s Empire State building, the windows of the famous skyscraper marked out in neat, bright colours. It is particularly poignant because the family are pinning their hopes on a trip to the Big Apple for potentially life-saving treatment for Beau. Shirley, 40, said: “Beau has a very rare form of cancer and is at a high risk of relapsing. If she relapses, the outlook is very bleak. “If we can get her to New York for a medical trial, she and other children like her could have the best chance possible of making it to adulthood.” In December 2020, when Beau was just four years old and at the end of her first term in school, she started to complain of tummy ache. Shirley, who is also mum to Redd, 10, said: “As mums do, I had a feel of her tummy, not knowing what I was looking for, and one side was rock hard. “The doctor initially thought it could be constipation so I treated her for that but three days later, the hardness in her abdomen had turned into a noticeable lump.” Fearing appendicitis, Shirley rushed Beau to Dewsbury hospital, West Yorkshire, where scans showed a tumour. Medics then transferred her, by ambulance, to Leeds Children’s Hospital to be seen by a specialist oncologist. There, Shirley received the devastating news that Beau had Stage 4 high risk neuroblastoma, a rare childhood cancer that at diagnosis only has a 50/50 chance of survival. Read more: https://www.thesun.co.uk/health/17570... To donate visit: www.getbeautosloan.com