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Six-year-old cancer survivor from Salford lands dream of becoming a YouTuber

Emily Sergeant - 4th May 2021

A six-year-old girl from Salford has battled a rare type a cancer to realise her biggest dream of becoming a YouTuber.

Local Worsley resident Isla underwent a gruelling eight-hour operation after she was diagnosed with a Wilms’ Tumour / Nephroblastoma – a form of kidney cancer which affects around 70 British children every year – and after having successfully come through the surgery and four weeks of chemotherapy, she decided to set her sights on her dream of becoming a YouTuber.

Her dream came true when she was given the opportunity by The Make-A-Wish Foundation to star in a video with viral singing sensation and YouTuber Rosie McClelland, who has nearly one million subscribers.

“It was way more than Isla ever expected,” Isla’s mum Jill admitted.

“We went to the Apple store in Manchester and picked up a laptop for her. Isla said, ‘is this mine, can I keep it?’, she couldn’t believe it. She was also given a vlogging camera, and then we drove down to meet YouTuber Rosie McClelland at her home in Hertfordshire.

“Obviously, I’d heard of Make-A-Wish and I knew exactly what the charity did but in that intense time [in hospital], I couldn’t see the light at the end of the tunnel.

“You’re just bombarded with information, and living in the moment, so we just put it to one side, but for Isla, it was looking forward to her wish and ringing the bell at the end of treatment that got her through”.

“It changed the way she talked about what was going on from ‘Am I going to get better?’ to ‘When I get better’.”

The touching story of Isla’s wish being granted comes as new research from the world-renowned charity shows that the number of children eligible for a wish has doubled in the last 15 years, and that there are currently 63,296 young people in the UK who have been diagnosed with a life-threatening or life-limiting condition.

The study also found that children in the north are more likely to be diagnosed with one of the aforementioned conditions, as are children aged between three and seven, those in Pakistani communities, and in areas of high social deprivation.

According to researchers at the University of York, neurological and respiratory conditions are the most prevalent.

You can find more information via The Make-A-Wish Foundation website here.

Featured Image – Make-A-Wish