A former soldier who bravely took on penny-pinching NHS bosses in his fight against terminal cancer has died, aged 37. Mark Bannister's wife has revealed how her husband was forced to LIE to doctors in order to get the life-prolonging treatment he had been denied due to a cruel postcode lottery. But after wasting six months of precious time trying to obtain the drug Avastin, Mark's cancer was too advanced for the medicine to have any effect. The dad-of-two succumbed to the brain tumour he had been battling for nine years at around 6am on Monday morning, with his wife Karen, 33, at his side. In tribute to her husband, who served in Northern Ireland and Bosnia during nine years in the army, grieving Karen said: "The Avastin didn't have any effect but we had to fight for six months in order to get it. "In all that time his tumour had been growing. In the end, he had to claim that he was living at another address in order to get the treatment. Who knows what would have happened if he had got the drug sooner - I truly believe it would have helped him.
A couple from Bristol have told that they are often mistaken for father and daughter because of their huge 36 year age gap .
A makeup artist from the West Midlands magically transforms herself into famous cartoon characters using body paint .
A mother-of-four has revealed how, like the Beckhams, she’s added an outside toilet to her home .
ARMED with her camera, bikini and flippers, this brave diver goes swimming with SHARKS .
LIFTING their heads high and bumping beaks, these aggressive pelicans clash over fish .
With a dust covered coat hung from a wardrobe door and a pair of glasses left on a shelf, a remote farmhouse lies abandoned in the Welsh countryside .
HOTSPOT MEDIA - EVANDER HOLYFIELD VISITS SICK KIDS: Evander Holyfield in Birmingham children's hospital, where he was giving presents to sick kids .
She was the 18th century celebrity who made men faint in awe of her beauty by her very presence .
A photographer has transformed women with alopecia into stunning sirens - showing that bald is beautiful .
A teacher has told how she was attacked by a murderer on her way home from a night out but courageously managed to charm him out of strangling her .
Pictures of John Anslow a prisoner who escaped from a prison escort van in North Worcestershire Monday, 23 January .
A small Indian monkey is seemingly gob-smacked after reading the latest stock market news .