Kris Hallenga saved thousands, she was an inspiration… celebs lead tributes to cancer campaigner after her death
THE founder of breast cancer charity CoppaFeel! Kris Hallenga died yesterday aged 38 — after teaching millions how to check their boobs.
Sun columnist Kris was given only a few years to live when diagnosed aged 23.
A GP previously suggested she “take primrose oil”, and an overall lack of awareness about the disease among young women led her to launch the charity, which has since raised £25million.
Kris’s Check ’Em Tuesday link-up with The Sun’s Page 3 girls also led thousands of readers to spot the disease early.
Leading tributes last night, pal and broadcaster Fearne Cotton said: “Kris lived fully, more than I’ve ever seen anyone live.
“When you were with her almost anything was possible. She would have an idea and two minutes later you’d be trying to plan how to bring it to life.
“She rarely took no for an answer . . . getting the best musicians to play at our festival, or convincing others to run marathons with giant boobs strapped to them.”
Another TV star friend, Lorraine Kelly, added: “So sad. An amazing young woman who has saved lives.”
One in seven UK women develop breast cancer in their lifetime.
One is diagnosed every ten minutes.
Kris’s exuberance broke taboos, like revealing inverted nipples were a sign of the disease. Her charity was also the first to get nipples on billboards and daytime TV.
She recruited more than 100 Boobettes — young survivors of the disease — to spread awareness in schools and colleges.
In 2012, Kris launched Festifeel — described as “Britain’s only boutique music festival with boobs in mind”.
And in March 2014 she teamed up with The Sun for Check ’Em Tuesday.
Within a week online searches for CoppaFeel! rose 2,000 per cent.
Kris wrote her Sun column for six years until January 2020.
And for nearly ten years, The Sun ran treks in aid of CoppaFeel!
Kris also wrote a best-seller, Glittering a Turd: How surviving the unsurvivable taught me to live.
Last June she held a “FUNeral” to celebrate her extraordinary life.
Dawn French, who dressed as her Vicar of Dibley character for the event at Truro Cathedral in Cornwall, said: “Kris wanted to host the best possible party.
“She did. It was phenomenal. What a total babe.”
In a statement yesterday CoppaFeel! said: “We share the sad news that our founder, boob chief, colleague, friend and queen of glittering turds, Kris, has died.
“Kris was the biggest promoter of being ‘alive to do those things’. She approached life in a wildly creative, fun and fearless way, and showed us that it is possible to live life to the full with cancer.”
Comic Russell Howard, who invited Kris on his Good News programme in 2014, said: “What an awesome, inspirational, life-chasing woman. An absolute pleasure to have known you.”
TV presenter Kate Thornton added: “This beautiful woman has left us. It was a joy to know you.”
Love Islander Faye Winter, who is taking part in a CoppaFeel! trek next month, said: “We will continue to raise awareness in honour of you Kris. Check your breasts today as she would have wanted.”
Actress Nadia Sawalha added: “Rest in peace Kris. You did glitter up that turd . . . ”
Journalist Rachel Richardson, who partnered Kris when CoppaFeel! joined forces with The Sun said: “No one loved living more than Kris. She squeezed everything out of each moment and did so fearlessly, creatively and with never-ending passion.
“Many would crumble if given the cards that Kris was dealt, but her diagnosis in some ways became a superpower. Cancer forced Kris to find her life’s meaning and to embrace death.”
In her first Sun column in 2014 Kris wrote: “‘You have incurable breast cancer’. These were the five words that shook my world, scared the hell out of me and made me hate the medical profession. I was just 23 and had been diagnosed with Stage Four secondary breast cancer. There is no Stage Five.
What an awesome, life chasing woman
Russell Howard
“These were also the five words that made me realise how awesome life is and made me determined to spend every minute of mine fighting to save the lives of others.”
Kris was on holiday in Barcelona with her identical twin Maren and mum Jean when she noticed a painful lump.
A doctor in the UK failed to diagnose cancer and told her to take evening primrose oil instead.
She then went travelling to China but on her return, mum Jean — whose own mum had cancer in her 30s — insisted Kris had more tests.
By then the cancer had spread to her spine and was incurable.
Kris wrote in The Sun: “The odds of me being diagnosed at such an age were one in 15,000.
“About a week after starting chemotherapy, I got my friends together and decided something had to be done about the severe lack of awareness aimed at young people about breast cancer . . . so CoppaFeel! was born.”
David Dinsmore, The Sun’s Editor in 2014, said yesterday: “It is very sad news about Kris but she held on amazingly well. She took a lot of flak for Check ’Em Tuesday but what was so great about her was that she didn’t really care.
“She knew The Sun would be a really good way of telling as many people as possible.”
And Kris’s response to criticism was: “Read the results.”
It led to two-thirds of our readers regularly checking their breasts and pecs.
More than seven in ten were now confident they would notice unexplained changes.
What a total babe…her farewell was phenomenal
Dawn French
Lynsey Hope, our former health features editor, said: “Many readers caught their cancer early and are still here today to tell the tale.”
In 2016 Kris was one of 50 breast cancer sufferers who took part in a 60km trek across Iceland along with Geordie Shore’s Vicky Pattison and reality TV star Chloe Madeley.
Our Fabulous Magazine editor Sinead McIntyre said: “Kris was a shining light on the trek.
“Full of fun, always laughing and keeping people’s spirits up even when she was struggling herself. I will never forget her.”
Today CoppaFeel! is the third best-known cancer charity in the UK.
In 2017, Kris stepped back to spend time in Cornwall with Maren, who married and had a son, Herbie.
When she moved there, Kris said: “Acknowledging that life isn’t going to be as long as you hoped is no bad thing. It helps you realise that the small joys — like playing with your nephew or stroking your cat — are actually the big ones.
“Trust your body, believe in hope, leave room for miracles.”
- To donate to the charity, or find out more go to coppafeel.org
Laughter & advice helped in my scare
By Hayley Minn
I DISCOVERED I had the BRCA1 gene mutation at the age of 23 — the same age Kris found out she had terminal cancer.
It meant I was 80 per cent more likely to get breast cancer than the average female.
In 2018, I joined CoppaFeel! as a Boobette — to spread the importance of checking your chest and telling Kris’s story.
For a lot of people, being told you’re going to die of cancer aged 23 would be the most devastating news, but she turned it into this incredible charity — which also brings young people affected by cancer together.
Through volunteering over the past seven years, I’ve met some of the most inspiring women — many of whom were diagnosed under the age of 30.
Whenever we got together at training days or at CoppaFeel!’s annual music festival Festifeel, there was always so much joy and laughter.
At a meet-up five years ago, before I was due to have a preventative double mastectomy, two women gleefully dragged me into the toilet to show me the results of theirs.
One of them had reconstruction, which I ended up having.
The second had one breast intact, while the other side boasted a beautiful tattoo of roses covering up the scar where it had been removed.
In 2022, when I worked on the door at Festifeel, I was lucky enough to meet Kris.
You’d never have known this was someone who’d been told they were dying of cancer 12 years before.
I think this is why I — and pretty much anyone who ever knew Kris — are so shocked she’s gone.
It felt like she would live forever.
She was one in a million and has left behind an incredible legacy.
Kris, you’ll forever be missed.
1.4 million reminded
COPPAFEEL! sent 1.4million text reminders last year to check boobs or pecs to 120,000 subscribers.
And 3,000 promotional packs were posted in 2023 to teachers, healthcare professionals and workplaces.
Meanwhile, Boobette volunteers delivered 404 stalls and talks across the UK — while 60 uni teams spread the word on campuses.
And £1million was raised from three CoppaFeel! treks alone last year — helped by celebs including podcaster Giovanna Fletcher.
In 2022, CoppaFeel! raised £4,068,682 — up 35.7 per cent on 2021.
The Sun’s Check ’em Tuesday had two-thirds of readers examining their breasts.