Barretstown launch livestream support for children affected by serious illness

The charity will livestream their camp activities into family homes all over Ireland during the Covid-19 outbreak.

A Co Kildare children’s charity has launched a new online interactive platform to support seriously ill children through the outbreak of Covid-19.

Barretstown offers free, specially designed camps and programmes for children and their families living with a serious illness.

Families and children that were due to attend the camp in the coming weeks will instead participate from home. The programme titled: Barretstown Live will be broadcast every Saturday and will run for the foreseeable future.

Barretstown will also broadcast for children across Ireland through Facebook live broadcasts taking place every Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday from 12pm to 2pm.

“The children Barretstown serves already suffer the effects of isolation due to the impact of a serious illness and the current situation is only making that worse,” said Barretstown CEO Dee Ahearn.

“Barretstown is doing everything it can to continue to support vulnerable children during this very challenging time,” she said.

Last year, Barretstown served over 9,000 campers affected by serious illness and their families.

Dee Ahearn said: “We need your help to both spread the word about Barretstown Live and also to make a donation if possible to support our work as we roll out this new online platform which will allow us to continue to deliver these life changing programmes.”