“God is going to reward you double or triple”, are the words with which María Alba Pérez Estrada asks for the support and empathy of other people to obtain donations for her, as well as for other women, with the aim of paying its treatment of about 60 thousand pesos against breast cancer.
At 35 years old, María Alba has two children: one 13 and the other 16 years old and tells how difficult it was for her to talk to them about the breast cancer that was detected on January 30 after she noticed in October “a lump in the right armpit and pain in the breast when making certain movements”.
In Tuxtla Gutiérrez, Chiapas, she works as a domestic worker, she also sells food and on weekends she referees volleyball games, but she dreams of going back to school and having a stable job to support her family.
Although at the beginning of her illness she sought and found the support of the Breast Cancer Foundation (Fucam), the same with which she obtained the initial part of the chemotherapies, today, like many other women, she lacks the resources to continue with the breast cancer treatment, disease that only in 2020 caused the death of 7 thousand 821 womenaccording to the National Institute of Statistics and Geography (Inegi).
Thus, together with the social enterprise Pro Mujer —with a presence in Mexico, Guatemala, Nicaragua, Peru, Bolivia and Argentina— and Pfizer, it participates in the “Tod@s for them” program with which he seeks to obtain 58 thousand 680 pesos through funds, money that would be used for 8 cycles of chemotherapy.
As little as the support that you can give me, it would be a lot and believe me, not only with me, but with many other people that you could do it”, comments María in a video to promote her campaign, in which people can donate any amount of money, but those who support with more than 300 pesos, will participate in the raffle for a Chiapas handmade hammock.
In this regard, the Global Manager of Representation and Gender of Pro Mujer, Natalia Wills Gilhighlighted at a conference the opportunities that women can have through this program to serve themselves, such is the case of Maria and two others, https://donadora.org/pro-mujersalud.
“This program offers the possibility that some women can start a crowdfunding or collection campaign in cases that are identified as having a positive finding for breast cancer, we have it and we generate, thanks to the support of Pfizer and Donadora, a space of donations for Pro Mujer Salud where we have already accompanied three women so that they can generate their campaign”, she said.
AN ALLIANCE AGAINST BREAST CANCER
Within the framework of the World Day to Fight Breast Cancer, on October 19, 2021, the Inegi reported that in 2019 15,286 new cases of breast cancer had been reportedof which 15 thousand 119 were in women and 167 in men.
In addition, since 2013, when a slight decrease was registered, and until 2020, the deaths of women from this type of malignant tumor increased 40.96 percent, so breast cancer continues to be the leading cause of death among Mexicans.
A relevant fact is that in 2020, at least 16 percent of women over 20 years of age who died from this malignant tumor did not have legal status, a situation that causes “health spending for the family to be higher since It implies the payment of studies, treatments, surgeries and hospitalizations”.
Access to health is a fundamental human right. Therefore, together with @FUCAMM y @LaCanaMx We visited the Barrientos prison and carried out more than 30 #mammograms women deprived of their liberty.
During the visit, we learned many stories. Elvira’s is one of them pic.twitter.com/9oJ5dTtGFL
– Pro Woman (@prowoman) May 19, 2022
In this way, Pro Mujer and Pfizer have been promoting the “Tod@s for them” program since last December, through which they seek that women not only provide counseling and psychological care for patients who suffer from the disease, but rather seek to enable them to access timely and effective diagnoses and treatments, and even financing, as is the case with María Alba.
“Tod @ s for them aims to reduce the barriers that prevent women from obtaining access to care during the detection and treatment of breast cancer,” said Wills Gil.
At the question of Digital Excelsior He explained that Pro Mujer currently carries out a follow-up process on 592 women over 40 years of age, of which 507 are still undergoing studies such as ultrasounds or biopsies to diagnose them or not with this breast tumor.
He indicated that the remaining 85 patients were already diagnosed with breast cancer, who are accompanied in their treatment process.
We have served more than 7,619 women with this program, Between last year and this year, we provided more than 4,000 free mammograms. and we currently have 592 women enrolled in the patient navigation program, which is this step-by-step accompaniment process so that they can access the corresponding health services,” she added.
Wills Gil highlighted that Pro Mujer, in 21 years in Mexico, has had an impact on the lives of women from 29 entities in the country, both in rural and urban areas.
FOR EARLY DETECTION
For his part, Dr. Francisco Olguín highlighted the importance of promoting the culture of check-ups to detect any anomaly in the breasts in time.
He explained that, according to Globocan, in Latin America and the Caribbean there are about 57 thousand cases of deaths due to breast cancer, which makes this region with higher mortality than North America.
He added that, in the case of Mexico, the records of the National Cancer Institute indicate that 60 percent of breast cancer cases were detected at an advanced stage.
“It must be emphasized that between almost half of cancers; that is, between 30 and 50 percent of cancers detected early or in a timely manner, the course of this disease can be avoided”, he assured, reiterating the need to encourage women over 20 years of age to constantly attend with their physicians, and perform a self-examination at least once a month.
The Medical Manager for the Oncology portfolio of Pfizer Mexico highlighted the alliance with Pro Mujer to reduce the barriers that prevent women from receiving timely treatments and diagnoses for this cancer.
Breast cancer, especially in Mexico, has many areas of opportunity to reduce the gaps in early detection, diagnosis and treatment, so building alliances of this type will always be beneficial for women”, she said.
In this way, María, only four days before the end of the funding campaign, María maintains the hope of collecting the funds for her chemotherapies, since Until today it adds 68 donors and 34 thousand 993 pesos of the 58 thousand 680 that it requires; that is, there remains 41 percent of the money to be collected to attend to their health and continue with their dreams.
Below we share information about how women’s deaths have increased due to breast cancer and the importance of self-examination, just scan the QR code and share or CLICK ON THE IMAGE.
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