Christmas appeal

The circumstances of this Christmas’s Telegraph Charity Appeal are highly unusual. The coronavirus has had a huge impact upon our way of life but, difficult though it has been, it has also inspired incredible acts of giving.

In the spring, we launched an additional appeal to help those whose lives had been devastated and whose families were in financial trouble. Our readers gave an extraordinary £1.2 million.

Building on that effort, we have decided that this year’s Christmas appeal should include charities that are helping those coping with the fallout of Covid-19. The first is Carers UK. Lockdown has made life particularly difficult for those who look after others. Calls to the Carers UK helpline have quadrupled.

Macmillan Cancer Support is there for anyone affected by a disease that, at times, has been eclipsed by Covid-19. It has been harder to get appointments and treatments have been delayed: Macmillan offers medical, financial and emotional backing to those who need it.

Refuge, our third charity, provides assistance to the thousands of women who experience domestic abuse: under the lockdown, the vulnerable have sometimes found themselves trapped with their abusers. And finally, there is Cruse Bereavement Care which gives support and counselling to those in mourning. The pandemic has taken away so many loved ones; the lockdown, sadly, can cast those left behind into isolation.

Any help you can give would be gratefully received: if you would like to make a donation, please go to telegraph.ctdonate.org or call

0151 284 1927.

From all of us at the Telegraph, thank you.