Monster appeal on track to raise $1m for child cancer

Criticism of the Child Cancer Foundation's Fight the Monster advertisements have not dented the charity's annual appeal.

Despite "seven or eight" complaints criticising the television commercial's likening of the disease to a monster, chief executive Jim Barclay said the appeal has been tracking "well ahead" of previous years.

The partially animated advertisements began screening last Thursday and ran for the final time last night.

It features the voices of Temuera Morrison, Kerre Woodham and Mikey Havoc, and has Connor Hourigan, 4, asking their cartoon alter-egos to "help fight the monster".

Herald reader Marianne Kayes wrote in, calling for the advertisement to be scrapped because it was "very scary and confusing" for young children.

But hundreds of others, including parents of children with cancer, had responded positively, said Mr Barclay.

"We do accept that from time to time people have differences of opinion, but really, the number [of complaints] that we've had is very, very small."

The monster analogy was chosen as a way of communicating the difficulties families living with childhood cancer face.

Children with cancer do portray their illness as a monster, he said.

The foundation aims to raise more than $1 million this year. Today is the biggest day of the appeal, with street collections taking place nationally.