JOINING the fight against breast cancer two years ago was a no-brainer for Black Ink Marketing & Event Solutions Ltd Chief Executive Officer Maxine Miller-Burkett, after the spouse of one of her employees was diagnosed with the condition at age 32.

Since then, Miller-Burkett has been raising awareness about the disease through various activities which promote the importance of early detection.

“We are hearing more and more cases of women being diagnosed even earlier than 30,” she said last Thursday.

The CEO, while noting that she wants more women to be screened for breast cancer, explained that her company last year partnered with nine facilities that offered a special discount on breast cancer screening for the month of October.

According to the CEO, 1,200 women were screened islandwide in that initiative.

With October mere days away, Miller-Burkett hosted a charity event, ‘Pink Breakfast’, at the Spanish Court Hotel last Thursday to raise money for this year’s effort.

“This year we wanted to double the effort and impact to reach more of our women. This morning’s occasion is to raise funds to sponsor at least 100 women who simply cannot afford to get their screening done for World Mammography Day on October 19.

“There are too many stories of our women increasing their risks due to fear. We cannot stress enough that early detection saves life. We are losing too many of our women to this disease. It has become a plague,” she reasoned.

Miller-Burkett argued that whenever a woman dies as a result of breast cancer, her family is displaced.

“I have a client in Panama. When we decided to do this initiative, that client came on board for the mere fact that they were alarmed that our country is screening at age 40. They screen in Panama at age 25, and they have very, very rare cases of women dying from breast cancer in Panama. So this is something that I think I would like to lobby the Government around,” Miller-Burkett said.

Dispelling rumours that mammograms are painful, she said when she did her second examination in July, she did not even realise that the procedure was finished.

According to the CEO, the target for last Thursday’s Pink Breakfast charity event was met.

“We will be able to provide the free mammogram vouchers to the women who are at risk, who cannot afford it, because someone taking home a $10,000 pay cheque will not take up $5,000 to go do a mammogram. They will be making life decisions, such as sending the kids to school, putting food on the table and paying bills,” she said.

— Racquel Porter