About Us

The Little Fighters Cancer Trust (LFCT) is a South African Non-Profit Childhood Cancer Support Organisation. LFCT was established in 2010 when it was realised that there are many Child Cancer affected families that need help but are falling through the cracks.

Our Vision

To provide practical & emotional support to children with cancer and their families, while working to raise public awareness of Early Warning Signs of Childhood Cancer throughout South Africa.

Our Mission

The Little Fighters Cancer Trust strives to relieve some of the heartache and difficulties faced by childhood cancer affected families, guided by the following goals:

• Providing support with a holistic approach, ensuring that individuals, families and communities are included.

• Treating Each Child with Cancer and his/ her Family as individuals, as we understand and respect the uniqueness of each situation.

• The preservation of individual dignity and pride.

• Promoting and advocating National Childhood Cancer Awareness in an effort to increase the amount of diagnosed childhood cancer cases in South Africa, as an increase in earlier diagnosis will result in a higher survival rate for children with cancer in South Africa.

Our Values

Our values provide the foundation of our organisation and underpin everything we do.

These values are:

• Empathy and Caring
• Respect for All
• Maintenance of Strict Confidentiality
• Preservation of each person’s Dignity and Individuality
• Integrity Beyond Reproach

Our Core Services

The Little Fighters Cancer Trust provides services in three core areas:

1. Hospital Ward Support
2. Individual Childhood Cancer Affected Family Support
3. Promoting and Advocating Childhood Cancer Awareness

The VOICE of Childhood Cancer Awareness
The HANDS of Childhood Cancer Support!

Our History

The Little Fighters Cancer Trust originally started in 2009 when the Founders became personally but indirectly affected by Childhood Cancer. Two children from different families within their personal circle of friends were diagnosed with cancer. While helping, they soon realised that there are many Child Cancer affected families that need help but are falling through the cracks.

The Trust was formalised as a legal entity and registered as a Non-Profit Organisation (NPO) and a Public Benefit Organisation (PBO) in 2010. The aim was to assist Children with Cancer in the Drakenstein area. The sheer amount of requests for help flooding in from all nine provinces begging for more to be done, however, led to LFCT becoming a fully-fledged National Childhood Cancer Support Organisation.

From helping 2 Children with Cancer in 2009, LFCT now assists thousands of Children with Cancer and their Family members throughout South Africa annually, impacting thousands more lives every year!

Our Promise

We will always go out of our way to assist wherever possible – funds dependent – and where we cannot help we will endeavour to put our beneficiary family in touch with an organisation that can.

Why We Do Not Do Fundraisers for Individual Children Fighting Cancer

The Little Fighters Cancer Trust offers varied, individualised, and targeted support to in excess of 100 Individual Childhood Cancer-affected Families on a regular basis as well as doing Hospital Ward and Place of Safety Projects.

We will make our assistance available to any Child with Cancer and their Family and will strive to do everything within our power to help.

• We do this by ascertaining the status of the child via a diagnosis provided by their oncologist;
• We will offer whatever help we can WITHIN OUR MEANS;
• Because we are small and depend on funding, we can only offer this aid until 6 months after a child has been declared in remission or 3 months after their passing.

LFCT receives minimal Corporate Support, NO Government funding, International Grants, or Lotto Funding; LFCT is 100% dependent on public funding.

We pride ourselves on NEVER turning ANYONE away but never making any promises that we may not be able to fulfill. From the very first conversation with Parents, we make it clear that we might not be able to do anything for them at all, as what we do and the regularity of any support we can offer depends completely on available resources.

The Little Fighters Cancer Trust is a small organisation with no offices and no vehicles, but in each and every heart burns a passion to help these brave Little Fighters!

The Trust is run by passion, determination, love, admiration, and, more often than not, on a shoestring and a prayer. We have experienced many instances in which we literally had only a few hundred rands in our bank account and 20 requests for urgent assistance from Families across South Africa. Somehow… we always make it work!

With more than 100 Individual Families on our books, 60 of which need assistance with groceries on a regular basis due to them being single-income or granny-run households, we need every cent that we manage to fundraise to help these families and for new requests for assistance that come in from Families and hospitals every day.

LFCT works very hard to fundraise and spends NO money on Fancy Events, Marketing, Branding, or Corporate Gifting. Our Auditors, Lawyer, and other Service Providers gift their professional services as donations so that every cent that we fundraise can go to those who need it most.

With so many Children with Cancer and their Families needing assistance, it is impossible to pick out one, two, or six, Children or Families per year for whom to do large fundraisers exclusively to pay for medical or other expenses. It breaks our hearts every time we receive such requests, but we cannot single out some to the detriment of others.

LFCT chooses to do what we can to lighten the load for as many families as we can and continuously tries to DO MORE for MORE Children with Cancer and their Families ~ where we can, and in whichever way we are able.

While LFCT does its best for every child with cancer, it reserves the right to refusal of assistance should it feel that its services, staff, or volunteers are being abused.