Breast cancer is a national disease affecting one in 26 women. The one unit is for education to facilitate early detection and the other a fully operational mammography unit. The intention is to give South Africa's mothers, grandmothers, aunts, sisters and daughters a chance of beating this disease through early detection and education.
The mobile units will travel around Gauteng, initially, to educate women on the dangers of breast cancer and the values of early detection. This will be done through easy-to-understand visual material in the vernacular, as well as teaching correct breast self-examination techniques.
M-Net's director of marketing, Koo Govender, said M-Net is proud to be part of such an important initiative: “The launch of these two mobile breast check units is an amazing opportunity for all South Africans to benefit from accessible education and assistance in dealing with a disease that can be beaten.”
The MBCU initiative is endorsed by former member of government Nozizwe Madlala-Routledge. “I applaud everyone involved in this project. Huge medical advances have been made with regards to breast cancer and these new breast cancer mobile units will assist in educating and saving lives at grass-roots level. I encourage everyone, whether an individual or business, to come forward and support this initiative - and as a breast cancer survivor myself, I urge all women to regularly go for check-ups.”
The mobile mammography unit will spend time both in the private and public sectors in a visible and tangible private/public partnership whereby the paying patients within the corporate and private sector will subsidise the free screenings at public hospitals where facilities do not exist.
“Support from the public sector has been overwhelmingly positive” says Noelene Kotschan from Cause Marketing. “The need is so great countrywide, that our vision is to have at least one mobile mammography unit and four educational units in each province, but this can only happen with the support of our own provincial departments of health and further private funding.”
