Dr Ané Büchner is Running the Comrades for Sick Children and Their Families

Photo Credit: Hamba Nawe Paediatric Palliative Care Project via Instagram

With every step she takes at the Comrades Marathon this Sunday, Dr Ané Büchner is running to bring comfort, dignity and support to seriously ill children and the families who carry so much behind closed doors.

Pretoria, South Africa (08 June 2026) – There are children in this country who are very sick, and their families are carrying an incredibly heavy load. Then there is a doctor who saw that and decided she could not look away.

Every day, Dr Ané Büchner, a qualified paediatric oncologist and palliative care physician at Steve Biko Academic Hospital, cares for seriously ill children. It is the kind of work not many can do, yet she does it with a steadiness and warmth that her colleagues find remarkable.

Beyond her role within hospital wards, she is the passionate driving force behind the Hamba Nawe Paediatric Palliative Care Project, an initiative she envisioned and brought to life out of deep compassion for children with life-limiting illnesses and their families.

Through this work, Ané helps change the lives of children and families, many of whom come from communities with very limited means.

Last week, the charity, which falls under the Grové Schoombee Foundation, registered its 400th patient just 16 months after being founded.

Many of the children she and her team serve have been discharged from state hospitals and are now receiving palliative care at home, often in places where running water is not always a given and families are living below the breadline.

“Many of these parents have had to leave their jobs to care for their child. The illness takes so much from them, long before the end,” says Yolanè Bezuidenhout, administrator of the Grové Schoombee Foundation.

The team also provides bereavement support in the hospital for families whose child is at the end of life.

“We run clinic days where outpatients come to us. We cover their transport costs to get there. We offer counselling, check their vitals, and send them home with nutrition packs and grocery vouchers. For a parent who has not been able to work for months, a grocery voucher is not a small thing. It is a real thing,” Yolanè explains.

Young warriors are also treated to little pockets of happiness because they deserve to feel joy, to feel celebrated, and to have experiences that mean something. Their families deserve those moments too.

This coming Sunday, 14 June, Ané is running the Comrades Marathon to raise R250,000 for this work.

This will be her eighth Comrades. She knows what it takes, and she is doing it anyway, because that is who she is.

Supporters can pledge per kilometre, making every step she runs on race day a direct contribution to another family’s support.