MARBLEHEAD — An 11-year-old battling a brain tumor was escorted through town in a parade of lights and sirens past hundreds of spectators Tuesday morning.
Sophia Smith was picked up at her home by Marblehead Police and followed by a procession of blue lights from cruisers and motorcycles, said Marblehead Police Chief Robert Picariello. Officers from the town and surrounding communities took part in the procession as friends, residents, and business owners lined the streets to cheer her on.
“It means a lot that so many people want to help me since it’s a lot of money to travel for treatments,” said Smith. “Sometimes it’s hard because it’s a lot of attention on me and sometimes I just want to be a normal kid.”
In March, Sophia was diagnosed with diffuse intrinsic pontine gliomas, an aggressive, rare, and difficult to treat brain tumor found at the base of the brain. She received radiation treatment at Boston Children’s Hospital for six weeks before moving to The Harley Street Clinic, a private hospital in London with world-leading specialist consultants in cancer, cardiac, neurosciences and pediatrics who provide treatment unavailable in the states.
Sophia’s medical team at Harley delivers chemotherapy directly to the tumor through a port behind her ear. Though it has been effective, it is not covered by insurance, said her mother, Jennifer Smith.
The family will travel to London for the fifth time on Saturday. The cost for the initial 10-hour surgery to install the port was more than $70,000, and each trip back to London costs about $20,000, she said.
The 11-year-old likes to craft, ride her bike, take photographs, and hang out with her friends to remind herself that she is still a child, she said.
Her best friend and twin sister Annabelle rode in the police cruiser with her during Tuesday’s event, which ended at Seaside Park, across the street from the police station. The Smith family was then presented a check for $5,000 from Cops for Kids With Cancer, a Massachusetts-based nonprofit organization that benefits families of children battling cancer. The organization was founded by John Dow, a retired police captain and cancer survivor.
Dow began donating funds to families of police officers and giving the remainder to other families of children with cancer who needed it. Dow died in 2007 and left the organization to the Board of Directors, which has since grown to include more than 20 members.
Cops for Kids With Cancer donates $5,000 to six families each month. Since 2004, more than $2.5 million has been given to families with children battling cancer.
“There was no doubt that Sophia was coming by,” said Marblehead Police Chief Robert Picariello. “You can see everyone wants to be a part of something that is a really nice thing to do. I think it was a tremendous tribute to the family and I can’t thank everybody enough for being a part of it.”
When the community caught wind of the cost for treatment, they began hosting fundraisers and making donations. Owen Dulac, 10, and his brother Teddy, 7, sold lemonade at Seaside Park during the last few days of their summer vacation to raise money for the family.
“The community has really done a great job,” said Picariello. “This past Saturday night they had a fundraiser. We had two little boys at the bottom of the hill near the police station setting up a lemonade stand. This is just a little piece of what the community as a whole has been doing.”
