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SPINNEKOP 2018 - endorsed by the Organ

Donor Foundation of South Africa

Julie Purkis
Public Relations Assistant
Centre for Tissue Engineering
Tshwane University of Technology
Tshwane

Why Spinnekop?
Organ donation is made possible by heroes – people who
voluntarily decide to donate their organs and tissue for
transplantation. Eric believes that anybody can make a
difference. The Spiderman costume is simply a metaphor or
symbol that anyone can be a hero and leave a lasting legacy
through donation. Recent statistics reveal that less than 0.2 % of
South Africans are organ donors.
www.health24.com/Medical/Heart/Heart-transplants/
shocking-less-than-02-of-sa-are-organ-donors-20170418

“We (I) will run for the Organ Donor Foundation of South Africa,
and my mission is to be a hero. We aim to educate people on
how easy it is to become an organ and tissue donor. Our thinking
is to take video-footage using GoPros daily and then post a short
clip of what we’ve experienced at the end of each day. This will
include interesting inserts of the terrain, i.e. desert scenery, wild
horses close to extinction, ad-hoc street interviews along the
route and footage of the journey’s highs and lows. These video
ric Kevin Nefdt is an Estate Agent, family man, aspiring updates will be shared publicly to
adventurer and proud organ donor. Better known as Facebook including community
Spinnekop (Afrikaans term for Spiderman), Eric pages along the route, and will
completed the 2017 Comrades Marathon (wearing his be supplemented with local ODF
Spidey suit) to draw attention to Heart Kids South street interviews and transplant
Africa. This, after training for more than a year in rush hour recipients.” said Nefdt.
traffic while wearing the superhero costume. His aim back
then was to create awareness around congenital heart disease Before Comrades:
and to raise funds for a little girl named Elisa (at that time only • h t t p : / / h o me t i mes.
3 years old) who had sustained various surgery-related co.za/2016/08/newsflash-
complications following 4 successive open-heart surgeries. sp i d erma n -sp o t t ed -
running-for-elisa/
During August 2018, Eric (together with a small support crew)
will attempt to run from Pretoria to After Comrades:
Lüderitz, a harbour town in Southern • www.runnersworld.co.za/motivation/why-i-ran-the-
Namibia, to create awareness around comrades-dressed-as-spider-man/
organ and tissue donation. The
THE REAl POWER lIES INSIdE yOu • https://maroelamedia.co.za/nuus/sa-nuus/pretoria-se-
1,500km marathon-a-day adventure eie-spiderman-draf-binnekort-tot-in-luderitz/
will be broken into some 42-50 days.
Eric has made application to Guinness In the build up and preparation Eric is delivering talks at schools
World Records and plans to set the and campuses, sharing his “Make A Difference” message. To
record for the furthest marathon run support his campaign, there will be a challenge and a link to
in a superhero costume. The Organ the ODF registration page. Think ALS Ice Bucket Challenge, but
Donor Foundation of SA, (ODF) in with greater appeal (more fun and less ice). Eric, together with
collaboration with Centre for Tissue Engineering (CTE) has friends, donor recipients and ‘celebrities’ will promote organ
officially endorsed this event and is including the Spinnekop donor awareness and more donor registrations.
Project amongst its Organ Donor Awareness campaigns for
August.

8 Vol 17 No 2 Issue 61 - August 2018