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Breast Care International (BCI) has a record crowd of forty thousand persons thronging the streets and Jubilee Park on Saturday October 1, 2016, to participate in the sixth breast cancer awareness walk, dubbed “BCI GHANA WALK FOR THE CURE 2016”, in the Ashanti regional capital, Kumasi.

The 2016 version, on the theme, “DON’T BE AFRAID, GET CHECKED, EARLY DETECTION AND PROMPT ACTION IS EQUAL TO PREVENTION”, was the city’s third in the six- year history of the program, which also attracted participants from the Netherlands, Tunisia, Morocco, the United Kingdom and the United States of America.

Drawing on history and precedence, organizers of this year’s event modified the program, focusing on school children who earlier in the day with a marathon in the form of a relay race, a symbolic walk from the labor round about to the jubilee park, before settling in for sharply dressed cadet corps from select schools, who marched briskly at the inner perimeter of the jubilee park, drawing admiration from the cheering crowd.

Breast cancer survivors, clad in pink, put up a spectacular display to dispel the myths and misconceptions surrounding breast cancer.

Dr. Beatrice Wiafe Addai, President and Founder of Breast Care International,  addressed the enthusiastic gathering, stressing that, “ the concentration on the youth has been thought through as part of the solutions to the issue of securing a breast cancer free generation in the foreseeable future.”

She continued, “there could not be a better way to achieve this ambition than to start the awareness creation among them at this stage of their development, where we are convinced they will both symbolize and internalize the campaign, with the message becoming integral of their daily lives.”

Dr. Wiafe paid glowing tribute to the hardworking staff of Peace and Love Hospitals, and Breast Care International, and commended partners and sponsors who had “ kept the dream of fighting breast cancer alive even in the face of mounting economic challenges” and was hopeful  “the torch lit by all stakeholders in the campaign against the breast cancer scourge, would be kept active and spread across borders with Ghana as the beacon and hub, of Africa’s campaign”.

Concluding, she charged the public not to be afraid, but get checked, and emphasized that early detection and prompt action, is equal to prevention.