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Tamale, Ghana – About 130 bakers in the Tamale Metropolis and Sagnarigu Municipality have benefitted from a breast cancer screening programme by Olam Grains, a subsidiary of Olam Ghana Limited.
The initiative, which is part of the corporate social responsibilities of Olam Grains, also educated beneficiaries on how to regularly self-examine themselves for breast cancer.
In partnership with the Tamale Teaching Hospital Community Outreach Department, a team of medical professionals led by Dr. Hawa Malechi, an Obstetrics and Gynecologist moved from one bakery company to the other to examine owners and workers of bakeries operating in the Tamale and Sagnarigu areas.
The screening programme also coincided with the WHO designated breast cancer awareness month which is the October.
Marked in countries across the world every October, the occasion helps to increase attention and support for the awareness, early detection and treatment as well as palliative care of the disease.
Globally, there are about 1.38 million new cases and an estimated 10 million deaths from breast cancer each year (IARC Globocan, 2018). The WHO reports that world cancer burden has gone up from 14.1 million cases in 2012 to 18.1 million in 2018. In 2018, Ghana recorded a total of 4,645 breast cancer cases.
Breast cancer is by far the most common cancer in women worldwide, both in the developed and developing countries. In low and middle-income countries like Ghana the incidence has been rising up steadily in the last years due to increase in life expectancy.
Northern Sector Zonal Sales Manager of Olam Grains, Seidu Yonye, said the company considered the screening programme very important because it bordered on the health and life of its customers.
“Our primary target in this business is largely women and their personal health is a concern to us. We believe that when they’re health they’ll be able to work and when they’re working we too are in business”, he told journalists during the screening programme.
Chief Executive of Yesu Adom Bakeries, Madam Comfort Abobbtie, lauded the initiative by Olam Grains to screen bakers in the Tamale and Sagnarigu areas.
“Breast cancer is a deadly disease because I know people who had cancer and took it to church and they eventually died. So what Olam is doing is very good”, she remarked.
By SavannahNewsOnline.Com/Philip Liebs
