You might, like me, have a bit of a phobia of rats. But APOPO, an organisation I first came across in Tanzania, work with pretty special ones. They’re trained to sniff out land mines. (In 20 mins they can search an area that would take 4 days with a metal detector.) And they’re also now being trained to identify diseases like TB.

I’m running the Hackney Half Marathon at the weekend, to support the great work APOPO do in places like Cambodia, Angola and Mozambique, saving lives and preventing injury, and restoring land for productive use to communities devastated by former conflict.

If you can spare a few quid to support their work in training the rats, it’ll be much appreciated!