By rdnewsNOW staff

two to three canadians die each day

Red Deer Walk Together for ALS goes June 15 at Bower Ponds

Jun 14, 2024 | 2:38 PM

The 2024 Red Deer Walk Together for ALS is happening Saturday, June 15, at Red Deer’s Bower Ponds.

There are nine walks across the province in 2024, raising funds for client support services and research in Alberta.

Each day, Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS) kills two to three Canadians, and around 3,000 Canadians are living with it

There is no known cure for the disease, which attacks the nerves of the body that would normally send messages from the brain to the muscle, resulting in weakness and wasting.

People with ALS are eventually left immobilized, with loss of speech and inability to swallow and breathe properly.

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This year’s Red Deer Walk ambassador is Wayne McCrackin, who told walk organizers of his ALS journey starting in 2022.

“I noticed some diminishing strength in my hands and arms when opening a water bottle or simply getting the lid off a jar,” he told them.

In early 2023, I made an appointment with my local physician in Innisfail who took my concerns very seriously and ordered many tests to rule out reasons for my weight loss and failing strength. In April of 2023, my doctor booked me in for an EMG with a specialist in Calgary to test for ALS. At the end of that appointment, the specialist compassionately told us that he was 99 per cent convinced it was ALS.

You can read Wayne’s full story here and register for the walk.

The Red Deer event has already raised over $26,000 of its $50,000 fundraising goal.

Registration is at 9 a.m., with a start time of 10.

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