Vuma’s partnership with PinkDrive continues to make an impact on the fight against cancer
Vuma plans to continue sponsoring PinkDrive and its efforts to provide screening services and education to communities throughout the country, empowering the organisation to reach more South Africans in rural, township, and semi-urban areas.
Over 200 Chatsworth community members received free screening for gender-related cancers, HIV/Aids, TB, diabetes, and COVID-19 in mobile health units set up at the RK Khan Hospital on World Cancer Day.
The initiative was a collaborative effort between Vuma, one of South Africa’s leading fibre providers, and PinkDrive NPC, a health sector NGO, to provide free medical screening and education to the community.
“We realise that COVID-19 has dramatically impacted South Africans’ ability to receive screening and treatment for communicable and non-communicable diseases,” says Lianne Williams, Head of Marketing for Vuma. “By sponsoring the PinkDrive, we're playing our part in providing resources to people so they can access to mammograms, gender-related cancer screening, education, and additional services that will improve their lives"
PinkDrive’s mobile health units look like doctors’ rooms on wheels. They boast a state-of-the-art gynaecology area for pap smears and examinations, a reception area for administration, and a radiology area. The units allow PinkDrive to simultaneously tackle the two most prevalent female cancers - breast cancer and cervical cancer - by offering cervical screening, mammograms, and clinical breast examinations. Men can undergo Prostate-Specific Antigen (PSA) screening for prostate cancer.
“An estimated 105 000 South Africans are diagnosed with cancer each year. This is an exceptionally high number of people who, without access to screening facilities, would otherwise only get diagnosed once their cancer reached its advanced stages, and treatment is more difficult,” says Noelene Kotschan, CEO and Founder of PinkDrive. “The funding from Vuma has allowed us to use our mobile health units to continue prolonging lives through the prevention of illness and disease, and by promoting healthy lifestyles.”