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Stephen Sutton - the inspirational cancer-stricken teenager whose fundraising campaign has become a worldwide phenomenon - has revealed that his health has improved since he COUGHED UP a tumour which was making it difficult for him to breathe.

Posting an update on Facebook today, Stephen, aged 19, revealed that his breathing had now dramatically improved.

He wrote: "I'm really stuck for the words of how to describe it. Throughout the night my throat was pretty sore but my 02 and other saturation levels are great. This morning I am relying on NO external oxygen to breath at all and I'm feeling bloody fantastic!"

Stephen's fundraising efforts came to the attention of the wider public and won the backing of celebrities when the former Chase Terrace Technology College student posted a heartrending farewell message on Tuesday.

At the time the fund stood at £580,000, but the whole world took notice and by this afternoon (Sunday 27) the total stood at £2,829,879.08.

Stephen added: "This whole week has been pretty unbelievable and I can barely fully get my head round everything that has gone on, but yesterday there was perhaps the most bizarre but fortunate twist in the tale yet."

He said that around mid afternoon yesterday he developed a slight cough which slowly got worse.

"After some visitors I had round in the evening left I tried sitting up in a chair, but straight away started asking the nurse to increase my oxygen levels as I was getting extremely short of breath. I then returned to my bed where I stabilised slightly for a while, but my breathing was still not right," he added.

"After a lying there for a bit longer the coughing increased and then suddenly the shortness of breath became incredibly severe. Amongst frantic hand pointing and panicking I felt like I was like suffocating.

"Then I forced out an oval red stained solid object through my mouth. My breathing and airway straight away felt clearer, but I spent the next hour violently coughing and choking, but then eventually my breathing once again stabilised."

He said that the only conclusion doctors could come to was that he had coughed up a tumour which was was blocking his airway.

"I have had an X-ray this morning which seems to show my right lung has inflated slightly, suggesting the substance I coughed up was also a significant pressure that was causing a restriction on the collapsed lung. Physiologically a tumour breaking away like this is possible, but it all just seems incredibly surreal - mind, I'm not complaining!"

He warned that his lungs were still stricken with further tumours and associated infections, but said that for now he was in a stable condition.

"I have no immediate problems and in fact feel better than I did when I first came into hospital last Sunday... It's still a case of taking each day as it comes, but at the moment the days just keep on coming!"

Meanwhile, a last-minute fundraising gig organised in Birmingham tonight (Sunday 27) by funnyman Jason Manford is set to be "a great night" because the terminally-ill teenager who inspired it is "just phenomenal", the comic said.







Manford rushed to organise the gig in aid of the Teenage Cancer Trust at at the Players Bar after speaking with Stephen at his hospital bedside this week.

The charity gig sold out in four minutes. "I wish all my gigs were like that. I am telling you I might have to get him (Stephen) to do my PR," Manford joked on LBC radio.

Manford, who met Stephen at a charity gig two years ago, visited the teenager in Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham on Thursday.

He said he was touched because Mr Sutton, despite being ill in bed, was "talking about putting the fun into fundraising".

Manford told LBC radio: "He is amazing. Even in his bed there with his tubes and masks with nurses coming in every 20 minutes to give him medicine, he was still talking about doing a sky dive and hoping to get in the Guinness Book of Records and different things on his bucket list.

"He said, 'Don't tug on people's heart strings and make people feel guilty - don't make people feel guilty because if they feel guilty they will give a fiver, if they are having fun they will give 20 quid'.

"We chatted for a couple of hours and he is very savvy. There is also something about him."







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This week he released a 10-minute YouTube video called When Life Gives You Cancer, featuring interviews with his mum, his school teachers and his best friend. In it he uses the pay-off line that "cancer sucks but life is great".

Celebrities including Stephen Fry and Russell Brand have backed Stephen's fundraising efforts, and music mogul Simon Cowell has pledged to make a "significant donation".

The band Coldplay plus actors Benedict Cumberbatch and Simon Pegg and footballer Ben Foster have posed for pictures holding signs to encourage people to donate, posted on Twitter with the hashtag thumbsupforstephen.

Stephen's brother Chris, 21, told the Sunday Mercury how the enormous tide of support has helped Stephen, saying that he has improved drastically since the start of the week when he looked so bad that he and his family thought he was near the end.

He said: "The support he has had has certainly had an effect. We are not out of the woods by any means but we have been amazed by his constant improvement and so have the doctors.

"The reaction from the public and the money he has raised has been mind-blowing."

The charismatic teenager yesterday wrote on his Facebook page that he was eating and drinking without help, able to sit in a chair and was less reliant on oxygen, despite his tumours still being rife and dangerous.

He said: "Today I'm feeling good and am continuing to recover well... These are all things that at the beginning of the week I never thought I'd be doing.





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"At one point I was told by a doctor that there was a good chance I was going to stop breathing soon and, after discussing why if this did happen putting me on high dependency care would not be suitable in my situation, my options would be severely limited.

"I could share more details and quotes, probably even sell my own 'miracle' story, but as mentioned before I'm not here to over sensationalise that part.

"The medical team around me did everything they could and my body just managed to cope with the trauma it was put under. I'm by no means out of the woods fully yet but I have been handed a life line and, although it may only be temporary, I am so lucky to have it.

"With the extra life I've been given I've got the chance to meet all you lovely people and together we've raised over £2.6million for Teenage Cancer Trust. I've been informed the figure has broken all previous records on Justgiving, which is just astounding.

"I am so grateful for everyone who has got involved and helped make this happen, the money raised will make a huge difference - thank you!!"

To donate to Stephen's appeal, visit www.justgiving.com/Stephen-Sutton-TCT



