By Jen Cowley

By the time your day ends today, at least one of your fellow Australians will have died from melanoma. The disease claims one life every six hours in this country, an estimated 1300 people every year across the nation.

In 2021, Carrie Ann Beggs was among them. She was just 43 when melanoma took her life, but a promise her family made to use her death to try to save others the same fate means she lives on in a loving legacy.

This month is Melanoma March, and the Beggs family is bravely continuing to fight the battle their precious girl began when she was diagnosed in 2018 with a condition that’s often referred to as “Australia’s national cancer”.

Carrie Ann’s mum, Ann, shares her story ahead of Dubbo’s Melanoma March on Saturday 26.

Also sharing their family’s story of loss to the insidious disease is the family of Lionel McGuire, who also died from melanoma in 2021.