Updated midnight
L-Istrina 2024 raised €5.2 million for the Malta Community Chest Fund on Thursday, broadly in line with the 2023 edition and slightly more than the previous year’s.
Malta’s largest annual charity telethon kicked off at noon and was broadcast on all television stations, with the public being urged to donate in person or via phone.
This year, it was broadcast from the Sports Complex in Kirkop.
The funds are mostly used to help finance expensive medical treatment for patients, including children.
President Myriam Spiteri Debono, who heads the Community Chest Fund, thanked all donors for their generosity saying they had confirmed her confidence in the sense of solidarity of the Maltese people.
L-Istrina has been running since 1995 and has over the years become a Boxing Day TV staple for many Maltese households.
In 2018 people donated a record €7 million, with donations gradually dropping to just over €5 million in 2022.
A total of €5.27 million was donated to L-Istrina last year, reversing the downward trend.
At noon on Thursday, President Myriam Spiteri Debono addressed parents who spent Christmas Day with their family members. She urged them to encourage their relatives to financially support those who could not get together with their relatives to celebrate Christmas, as they were facing an illness in their own family. Help us help those who need help, she said.
At the launch of the marathon, Prime Minister Robert Abela presented a donation of €100,000 from the Social Causes Fund.
He said l-Istrina had become synonymous with the values of solidarity and generosity. Illness can hit anyone, he warned, urging people to come together and empathise with those who were suffering.
"It's an occasion that brings people together - it unites us all in solidarity, " he said, while urging those facing health challenges to focus on their wellbeing and let the state and the people focus on their financial needs.
PN leader Bernard Grech meanwhile referred to l-Istrina as a long tradition that united generous people.He too urged people to do their part and back those facing challenges by donating money to help them get back on their feet.
Archbishop Charles Scicluna meanwhile noted that "the gift of l-Istrina" should come from the heart. He said it symbolised wishes of good health, blessings and solidarity.
Among those supporting l-Istrina was Paul Spiteri Lucas who earlier this year lost his wife and mother to their son Sam. Emanda died after a three-year battle with melanoma.
Among others, the family was supported by the Malta Community Chest Fund. Josie and Maruska - parents of the late Jake Vella are also urging the people to contribute. The inspirational teenage athlete died in August aged 15 after fighting an extremely rare condition that caused him to gain weight rapidly despite eating healthy and training continuously.
In an interview published hours before this year's marathon, President Myriam Spiteri Debono spoke of how a recent visit to patients being treated in London distressed her.
The President said she witnessed people's sacrifices, and physical - but also mental - suffering.
"I met a family composed of the mother, father, their baby and the maternal grandmother who, at one point, opened up to me," the President recalled."Apart from what she was feeling and her wish to see her grandchild recover, she also spoke of how her own child was going through the ordeal just as she had started living her own life.
"This grandmother was... carrying psychological pain that only a grandmother would. She is not just seeing her grandson, but also her daughter suffering," Spiteri Debono said, adding that her son-in-law had meanwhile stopped working.
The family had already spent some time in London and did not know when they would be returning home.
"Maybe people out there think of how, when faced with illness, we need to look for treatment to maybe achieve some cure.
"But it's not just about cure. Illness throws families into further suffering as most often their income is slashed."
Photo: L-Istrina