STAFF at the Globe showed their support for Breast Cancer Awareness Day last Friday by dressing in pink as part of the 'wear it pink' campaign.

Launched last year, the 'wear it pink' campaign encouraged everyone to wear an item of pink, a whole outfit, or just a pink ribbon and donate £2 to the Breast Cancer Campaign to help it continue funding independent research into finding a cure for breast cancer.

The pink ribbon is the generic symbol for breast cancer awareness throughout the world.

The success of the 'wear it pink' campaign was beyond expectations for Samantha Campbell, Breast Cancer Campaigns new Events Manager, who came up with the idea.

"I can hardly believe the number of donations we have received - its enough money to fund five brand new research programmes for the future," she said.

"It has been the most exciting campaign I have ever been involved in and we're all really thrilled."

More than 4,300 companies and individuals took part, raising over £600,000.

Breast cancer is the most common cancer in this country, with nearly 41,000 new cases diagnosed each year. One in nine women will develop breast cancer at some point in their lifetime, and four in five of them will be over 50. Men can also get breast cancer, although this is rare - around 300 cases are diagnosed each year.

Breast Cancer Campaign was established in 1988 with the aim of researching the cure for breast cancer by funding research which looks at improving diagnosis and treatment of breast cancer, better understanding of how it develops and ultimately curing the disease or preventing it.

Over the past nine years, the charity has awarded 84 grants with a total value of nearly £6.8m to universities, medical schools, teaching hospitals and research institutes across the UK. The good news is that thanks to earlier detection and improved treatment, breast cancer death rates in the UK have fallen by a fifth in the last ten years.