Tis’ the season of giving, and last Thursday at the Jingle Mingle gala, the giving was big.
The glitzy gala held at the Fairmont Empress Hotel raised a record-breaking $905,000 to support immune therapy research at the B.C. Cancer Agency Vancouver Island Centre.
The Jingle Mingle has received a lot of support in the past. Last year, it raised $602,000 and in the last seven years it has raised $2.6 million for cancer research on Vancouver Island.
Funds raised Thursday will support the infrastructure for a “clean room,” which is a highly-specialized, sterile environment for the production of T-cells.
T-cells are a type of white blood cell that is a key component to the immune system and is a critical part of the immune therapy clinical trial happening at the Deeley Research Centre in Victoria.
The Deeley Research Centre studies the response of the immune system before, during and after standard cancer treatments.
