ABS-CBN chairman Eugenio “Gabby” Lopez III and president and CEO Charo Santos Concio showed their support for the worldwide campaign for raising awareness and research funds for the neurological disorder Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS) or Lou Gehrig’s Disease by accepting the ice bucket challenge.

Lopez accepted the nomination of news anchor Noli de Castro and IBM Philippines general manager Mariels Almeda Winhoffer and agreed to get doused with a pail of iced water. Concio, meanwhile, took the cause after being nominated by news reporters Doris Bigornia and Gretchen Fullido.

ABS-CBN president & CEO Charo Santos Concio takes the ice bucket challengeLopez passed on the dare to GMA 7’s Felipe “Henry” Gozon and TV 5’s Manny Pangilinan, while Concio challenged senator Grace Poe Llamanzares and actress Dawn Zulueta.

Among the Kapamilya celebrities who also joined the popular social media sensation were Lea Salonga, Kris Aquino, Anne Curtis, Vice Ganda, Angel Locsin, Luis Manzano, Kathryn Bernardo, Daniel Padilla, Vhong Navarro, Billy Crawford, Coleen Garcia, Paulo Avelino, Nadine Lustre, James Reid, Darla Sauler, among others.
News personalities de Castro, Ted Failon Korina Sanchez, Karen Davila, Bernadette Sembrano, Anthony Taberna, Bigornia, Mario Dumaual, Ginger Conejero, Fullido, TJ Manotoc, Pinky Webb, Ron Cruz, and Paolo Abrera also took the challenge.

Introduced by Washington-based ALS Association, the ice bucket challenge dares nominated participants to be filmed having a bucket of iced water poured on them, and then challenging others to do the same. Challenged individuals will have to comply within 24 hours or forfeit by donating money. However, some of the Kapamilya personalities opted to both donate to ALS Association and comply with the challenge.

According to www.als.org, the campaign has raised more than $100 million (over P4.3 billion) of donations as of August 29, 2014. (Story/photos by Kane Errol Choa)