Warsop mum raises £3,000 for charity fighting life-threatening infection developed by her son at just 17 days old

Shawna Louise Fox’s baby, Harry, spent Christmas in intensive care after developing Group B Streptococcus (GBS) which led to meningitis and sepsis.

GBS is the UK's most common cause of life-threatening infection in newborn babies, and it is carried by one-in-four women, but it is not routinely tested for by the NHS in the UK.

Shawna and some friends recently ran 13.1 miles from a gym in Warsop to Mansfield Woodhouse and back to raise money and awareness for Group B Strep support, the charity fighting for GBS.

Shawna said: “It is for my little boy who developed GBS (Group B Strep) at 17 days old and he ended up with meningitis and sepsis from it, and he was in intensive care over the Christmas period, so we did the half marathon to raise money and awareness for the Group B Strep charity.”

Shawna’s son Harry is now 20 months old, but what GBS means for his health long term is unknown and, because of his age, his brain is still vulnerable.

"He is doing OK, he is obviously a bit behind with development because he has a small part of brain damage from the meningitis so we are going though all the physio, and trying to get him to walk,” Shawna said.“Quite a lot of babies die from it, so we are just really lucky that we have still got him.”

The half marathon raised a huge £3,000 for the GBS charity, with some of it coming from Shawna’s friend Nikki Bordacs, who owns NDFitness in Warsop, and also ran the half marathon that started from her gym.The money raised will go towards supporting the Group B Strep charity, who offer support, information, and even a test for the infection.

However, the most important part of the half marathon was the awareness that it raises – as many pregnant women do not know how detrimental the infection can be.

Shawna said: “The money mainly goes towards the awareness around GBS, because the NHS do not routinely test for it.

“It lives in the women and other countries routinely test but they do not over here, which is very frustrating because one in four women carry it.

“If it goes untreated, you can get very ill babies and quite a lot do die from it because it is too much for them.

“We are trying to get out there that you can do tests privately - which is £35.

“Four of my friends that have recently been pregnant have done the test and two of them tested positive, so they got the treatment in time so that their babies were not poorly.

"They got tested because of what I have been through, so it just goes to show if I had not mentioned it they could have gone through what we have had to go through.”

For more information on GBS, and how to order a test, visit: www.gbss.org.uk.