Parents use heartbreak to start a campaign to save lives

Lee and Helen Draper's daughter, 18-year-old Meg, died of meningitis B while at university

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LEE and Helen Draper will never forget the day they received the phone call every parent dreads.

Their sporty, outgoing daughter Meg was ill hours away from home.

Meg, 18, from Pontypool, started at Bournemouth University in September and was thriving, getting stuck in with netball and swimming and loving meeting new people.

But just five weeks in, that dream start became a nightmare overnight when Meg developed a temperature and a rash. Four days later she died from meningitis B (MenB).

Her parents had assumed she'd been fully vaccinated against the illness when she was jabbed at age 14 but later found out this didn’t protect their daughter against the strain most prevalent in her age group.

“You just assume that you have a meningitis vaccination and it protects you against meningitis,” said Helen.

Now, Meg's parents are trying to raise awareness about what they perceive as a lack of information surrounding the different strains of meningitis and are keen to make the vaccine they wish Meg had taken more accessible.

Lee said: “Meg was just lovely. She was kind, caring, she just liked being around people, she liked helping people as much as she could. She just wasn’t your typical teenager!”

Helen added: “She was really outgoing and chatty, she was really sporty so loved anything that would get her out and about and enjoying life. She was all about other people and she was gregarious, she didn’t fear a lot, she just wanted to live life.”