KUCHING: There are over 5,000 cases of cancer in Sarawak per year of which 500 to 600 are breast cancer cases, that is, every day there are one or two people affected by it.
Making matters worse, more than 50 percent of them are level 3 to level 4 cases which are the malignant stages.
Minister of Welfare, Community Well-being, Women, Family and Childhood Development Datuk Seri Fatimah Abdullah said since cancer is widespread it is a reality of life and needs to be detected early in order to save lives.
She urged women of all ages to be aware of the changes that occur in their bodies. They need to be familiar with how their breasts normally look
like and feel, as well as the
signs and symptoms of breast cancer.
“Finding breast cancer early is one of the most important ways to prevent death from cancer. When it is found early, it
is small and has not spread,” she said.
“The sooner the cancer is detected, the more chance for the treatment to succeed and the person diagnosed with the disease could continue on like other people,” she said.
She raised awareness of this during the second anniversary fundraising dinner of the Society for Cancer Advocacy and Awareness Kuching (SCAN) held at Sarawak Club last Wednesday night.
Other than what he ministry is doing, Fatimah said that this year the clinical unit of the National Population and Family Development Board (LPPKN) focuses on three major programmes.
It is known as My Mammo (early detection of breast cancer through ultra-sound testing), My HPV (Human Papillomavirus), HPV
vaccination programme and My HPV DNA (self-taking of HPV test samples using special tools).
It is estimated that a total of 9,600 women in Sarawak benefit from this programme. The
outreach campaign was also conducted by LPPKN to raise awareness of the dangers of breast cancer and cervical
cancer.
