The viral ALS ice bucket challenge, which has prompted dozens of celebrities (and at least one former president) to dump buckets of ice water over their heads, has apparently done more than spice up your Twitter and Instagram feeds. More than $41.8 million have been raised for amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, a.k.a. Lou Gehrig’s disease, as a result of the viral challenge. The money came in from over 739,000 new donors, who together donated more than double what the ALS Association received in the year that ended Jan. 31, 2013, according to the nonprofit’s IRS filing. “While the monetary contributions are so absolutely incredible, and we’ll be able to really make a considerable difference in moving the mission of the ALS Association forward, the real fortunate part of the Ice Bucket Challenge is the amount of awareness it has raised for the A.L.S. cause in general,” ALS Association spokeswoman Carrie Munk said. “It puts us in a whole different ballgame to find treatments and cures for this disease.”
