According to the Breast Society of Ghana, 50% of the approximately 4,000 women diagnosed with breast cancer die each year.
This was revealed during the society’s 4th Annual General Meeting (AGM) on Friday in Accra, with the topic “Improving Breast Diseases Outcomes, the Role of the Breast Society.”
Dr. Efua Commeh, Acting Programme Manager of the Ghana Health Service (GHS) Non-Communicable Disease Control Programme, has thus urged for aggressive public awareness efforts to dispel misunderstandings about breast cancer and save more lives.
She emphasized that early identification of breast cancer helps to avoid complications and mortality from the disease.
“Unfortunately, we lose a lot of women because they come in stage three and four. This is not acceptable anywhere. If cases were coming in stage one, for instance, treatment is better and the patients themselves will be better. They don’t need to go through expensive chemotherapy and other treatments, which can be very worrying for the patient. All these treatments come with side effects as well.”
“So we keep preaching that early detection saves lives. That is what it means. When we pick you up early enough, we will be able to treat you so that you can continue living your normal life, and we don’t continue having the high deaths from cancers that we have.”
