A Miss York finalist today revealed that she needs a double lung transplant.

Emma Young, who is just 22, suffers from cystic fibrosis and has already been in York Hospital for more than three months.

Her hopes are now pinned on a transplant, and she says doctors have told her she is likely to go on the list in a couple of weeks. Cystic fibrosis affects the internal organs, especially the lungs and digestive system, by clogging them with thick sticky mucus, making it hard to breathe and digest food.

The former beauty therapist, from Pickering, is on an oxygen supply 24 hours a day and uses a wheelchair to get around.

“Hopefully a transplant will enable me to live a full and happy life, without the oxygen, the ventilator, and the wheelchair, and it’ll enable me to do a lot more.” Emma added: “Hopefully I’ll be well enough to go to the Miss York 2009 final in April.”

‘Hopefully it will enable me to live a full and happy life’

A 22-YEAR-OLD Miss York finalist who suffers from cystic fibrosis today revealed she is set to be put on a waiting list for a double lung transplant.

Emma Young said doctors had told her it was likely she would go on the list in a couple of weeks.

Cystic fibrosis affects the internal organs, especially the lungs and digestive system, by clogging them with thick sticky mucus, making it hard to breathe and digest food.

Emma, who is on an oxygen supply 24 hours a day, was admitted to York Hospital more than three months ago, after her condition deteriorated.

“I was very poorly,” the former beauty therapist said. “I couldn’t walk very far.” Since Emma went in to hospital, she has only left it once, to go to the Freeman Hospital, in Newcastle-Upon-Tyne, for a transplant assessment.

Speaking about how the operation would help her, Emma, who has to use a wheelchair to get around, said: “Hopefully it will enable me to live a full and happy life, without the oxygen, the ventilator, and the wheelchair, and it’ll enable me to do a lot more.”

Emma, of Pickering, told The Press she was hoping the surgery would allow her to, go back to work as a beauty therapist and go on holiday.

She said: “Just literally to be able to walk up the stairs and things like that without coughing and struggling – just the littlest things will be the best”.

Emma, who reached the last hurdle of Miss York 2008, revealed how she was confident she would be going to Monks Cross Shopping Park in York next week for a couple of hours for some retail therapy.

Emma also said she believed she would be well enough to return home in a few weeks. She said she was waiting for test results to come back, and they would determine whether she would go on the list.

She said she did not know when she would have the transplant, but there were about 80 other people on the list.

She thanked staff on Ward 34 at York Hospital.

“They’ve been fantastic,” she said.

“They’ve been like a family, all the nurses and doctors. “Hopefully I’ll be well enough to go to the Miss York 2009 final in April.”