The red-hot “Ice Bucket Challenge” has brought in more than 100 donations to the UMass ALS Cellucci Fund in a matter of days, as families across the state and the country take the plunge to raise awareness of ALS and open up their wallets to support ALS research.
Chancellor Michael Collins and Chair and Professor of Neurology Robert Brown Jr., DPhil, MD, accepted the challenge last week, before 125 new medical students and Dr. Brown’s research lab on the lawn of the Worcester campus. Video of the doctors being soaked was shown on NBC Nightly News.
Charter TV3’s Worcester News Tonight and New England Cable News also covered the story, interviewing Dean Terence Flotte and the late Gov. Paul Cellucci’s family on the importance of ALS research at UMMS. Gov. Cellucci, who died of ALS in 2013 at 65, helped launch the UMass ALS Cellucci Fund to support the work of Brown, an internationally renowned ALS researcher and the governor’s former doctor.
Chancellor Collins is encouraging participants in the viral video campaign to donate to umassals.com and tag their videos with the website link.
