healthmedicinet

“The general oncologist and team I’ve been seeing will discuss the
events with my professor in the morning and we will see where we go from
there … It’s still a case of taking each day as it comes, but at the
moment the days just keep on coming!!”

This week he also released a 10-minute YouTube video called When Life Gives
You Cancer, featuring interviews with his mum, his school teachers and his
best friend. In it he uses the pay-off line that “cancer sucks but life
is great”.

Manford has now rushed to organise a gig in aid of the Teenage Cancer Trust
after speaking with Mr Sutton at his hospital bedside this week. The charity
gig in Birmingham sold out in four minutes.

Manford said it is set to be “a great night” because the
terminally-ill teenager who inspired it is “just phenomenal”.

Mr Sutton has caught the public’s imagination with his positivity and refusal
to feel sorry for himself after being diagnosed with bowel cancer at the age
of 15.

The teenager, from Burntwood, Staffordshire, last year set up a bucket list of
things to achieve before he died – including raising £10,000 for the trust.

He upped the figure to a £1 million after becoming an Internet sensation and
has now raised more than £2.8 million with the total rising rapidly.

His cause is aided by a number of celebrities, including Sherlock star
Cumberbatch and Hot Fuzz actor Pegg, the band Coldplay and footballer Ben
Foster, who have all posed for pictures holding signs to encourage people to
donate, posted on Twitter with #thumbsupforstephen.

Manford has said he would like to help him raise £5 million.

The stand up comic, who met Mr Sutton at a charity gig two years ago, visited
the teenager in Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham on Thursday.

He told LBC radio: “He is amazing. Even in his bed there with his tubes
and masks with nurses coming in every 20 minutes to give him medicine, he
was still talking about doing a sky dive and hoping to get in the Guinness
Book of Records and different things on his bucket list.

“He was talking about putting the fun into fundraising.

“He said, ‘Don’t tug on people’s heart strings and make people feel
guilty – don’t make people feel guilty because if they feel guilty they will
give a fiver, if they are having fun they will give 20 quid’.

“We chatted for a couple of hours and he is very savvy. There is also
something about him.”

Celebrities including Stephen Fry and Russell Brand have already backed Mr
Sutton’s fundraising efforts, and music mogul Simon Cowell has pledged to
make a “significant donation”.