Brave Paralympian passes away

9:35am Friday 7th November 2008

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AN indomitable Moreton woman has died just months after getting out of her hospital bed to qualify for the Paralympics.

Lynne Burton, 34, needed to undergo a third liver transplant but a suitable organ could not be found, resulting in her condition deteriorating until she passed away.

She finished second in a selection shoot to qualify to represent Britain in the archery competition at Beijing’s 2008 Paralympics.

This was while she was being treated at London’s Royal Free Hospital after suffering chronic rejection of the latest of two liver transplants she underwent because of a condition she was born with.

Lynne had been wheelchair-bound since 2000 when she suffered spinal cord damage in a car accident that happened four days after she left hospital following one of the transplants.

The hospital allowed her to attend Paralympic selection in Shropshire but she was not well enough to drive, so her coach travelled from Kent to drive her there.

She was too weak to self-propel her wheelchair but still shot the required eight dozen arrows.

Lynne, who had already competed in the world archery championships, was driven straight back to the hospital where she hoped to get fit for Beijing but her consultant told her she was too poorly to compete.

She subsequently aimed to get fit to compete in London’s 2012 Paralympics.

Lynne’s mother, Jen Burton, said she and her husband, Ralph, were “terribly proud” of her.

Mrs Burton said: “She wanted to help people and her best asset was really that people liked her.

“People just couldn’t resist what her father called her silly grin.”

Lynne was cremated at private ceremony but her life will be celebrated in a public service to be held at Chipping Campden’s parish church on a date to be arranged.

Mrs Burton appealed for more organ donors to come forward.