VIDEO: Schoolboy given three weeks to live delivers emotional speech to entire school

18-year-old cancer patient Jake Bailey was told by his doctors that he wouldn’t be able to attend his school’s prize giving ceremony as he lay in his hospital bed, it was advice he felt he had to ignore.

Last week Jake - from Christchurch, New Zealand - received the news that he had Burkitts non-Hodgkins lymphoma, a very fast growing and aggressive form of cancer.

Without treatment Jake’s medical team estimate he has about three weeks to live and now faces intensive bouts of chemotherapy.

At the start of the year Jake was named senior monitor at Christchurch Boys’ High School - a position similar to president of a student council or head boy.

If you can’t see the Facebook post, you can view it here.

After his diagnosis doctors felt he would be too ill to give the traditional senior monitor speech at his school’s annual prize giving, but Jake was determined to defy the odds.

What followed is one of the most inspiring and emotional speeches you are ever likely to hear and there’s even a surprise Haka at the end. There are many shortened versions out there on YouTube, but we feel it is important to listen to Jake’s speech in its entirety.

"None of us get out of life alive, so be gallant, be great, be gracious, and be grateful for the opportunities you have." - Jake Bailey, 2015

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