SCHOOLMATES of heart patient Lori Weeks dressed all in red to help raise money for a second life-saving defibrillator.

The efforts of youngsters at Noremarsh Junior School in Royal Wootton Bassett have already resulted in one of the £2,000 machines being installed in the high street. But now they are on a mission to buy one for themselves.

Lori was born with a congenital heart defect and has undergone many operations in her eight years. She also fought and survived a potentially fatal heart infection.

Her mum Niky Philpot said she was backing the fundraising campaign because of the number of deaths and heart attacks nationwide that were caused by undetected conditions, especially among youngsters playing sport.

“I’m pleased that the school has recognised it and is doing something for it. The defibrillator in the high street has already been used.”

Luckily, Lori’s condition was picked up before she was born, but said Niky: “She has it for life - it is lifelong medication and surgeries.”

Even though she is regarded as delicate that doesn’t stop her being a normal child like her twin sister Luci. “She’s very stubborn. I think that’s why she has got through it.”

The red-themed day, which raised money for the British Heart Foundation as well as the defibrillator fund, came just before the start of Congenital Heart Defects Awareness Week.

The condition affects more children than all childhood cancers combined and is the number one birth defect in the UK, affecting nine in every 1,000 babies.

Many conditions are not diagnosed until childhood, teenage years or even adulthood and some are only discovered after death.