Why Are So Many People Doing The Ice Bucket Challenge and What Is ALS?

It’s cool to watch people doing the ice bucket challenge but then after a hundred or so videos, you started wondering why are so many people doing the ice bucket challenge? And then you started thinking what ALS is and what is the connection between the two.

Why Are So Many People Doing The Ice Bucket Challenge?

The ice bucket challenge, according to Wikipedia, was popularized in the United States on June 30, 2014 when it was performed live in Morning Drive. And soon, people who knows someone with ALS started doing the challenged and calling on their friends (who also knows someone suffering from ALS) to do it as well.

The challenge: You need to do the ice bucket challenge, 24 hours after seeing the message of the person who challenged you. If you don’t, you need to donate to ALS foundation.

If this is the challenge, why are so many people STILL doing the ice bucket challenge?

I guess, somewhere along the road, the challenge changed.

If you decline the ice bucket challenge, you have to donate $100 but if you do it, you only have to donate $10.

And then all the celebrities are doing it (even local celebrities)..and I am assuming that they did not JUST donate $10.. so another rule has been added. Donate and have fun with the challenge.

What is ALS?

I am not in the position to talk about ALS because I don’t have a slight idea what it is… well not until the #alsicebucketchallenge started trending.

ALS or Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis is a kind of disease that affects the motor neurons. It is a progressive neurodegenerative disease that affects nerve cells in the brain and spinal cord (according to tobii.com).

The keyword is progressive and as the disease progresses, it leads to the weakening of the muscles and to paralysis. I know we cannot fully understand how it is to live with a person suffering from ALS, but this video is close enough (jump to 2.05):

Lea Salonga’s ice bucket challenge is too good not to share. She mentioned about the donation and encourage everyone to do it. I hope if you’re going to do the challenge, include a short speech and call for donation and not just nomination.

Where to donate for ALS?

You can donate at ALS Association website (CLICK HERE). ALSA is an American non profit organization that raises money to fund research about ALS and other things related to ALS.

Is there a support group or ALS organization in the Philippines where you can donate?

ALS Philippines Facebook page offers support but does not accept donations yet. Here’s a statement from ALS Philippines:

This page is more like of a personal page I set up for my aunt who was diagnosed with the disease. We cannot find any association or support group here and so I reached out to some international organization and communities.
All I was advised was to create a page to serve as a link for those who are affected in the country. Thus, this page.
Now we have been receiving a lot of feedback from people asking about the ALS challenge, where to donate and information about my page.
Unfortunately, we cannot accept donations.
We are doing all we can now to see what we can do about this.We are trying to get in touch with The ALS Association Support Group in the Philippines which I am not sure if still existing. We are hoping to re-establish this. We reached out to the ALS association community and some other International organizations supporting ALS and see what they would say about this.
We are trying to work with some local TV networks and asks for help, for those who wants to donate or we’ll wait for the response of our local support group as to where we can direct people for donations.
Families who are affected in the country are starting to respond and hopefully soon an official support group will get established so families who are affected could help each other, in terms of sharing their experience and ideas in coping with the disease. Turns out, there are a lot of people here in our country living with ALS. We would like to encourage the families of those who are affected to share their experience and that they are free to post and share on this page.
We will update people thru my page as soon as as possible. I am very overwhelmed by the response of the people. The Ice bucket campaign is such an excellent idea and I am happy that people are starting to get aware of the disease.
In the meantime, for those who were challenged to do the ALS ice bucket, thank you, it will be a great help in spreading ALS awareness in the country.

So, are you ready to donate and have some fun?

The best ice bucket challenge I have seen so far (in terms of fun) is Nonito Donaire’s ice bucket challenge.