When I travel the state to give presentations about breast health basics, I talk about all of the advancements we have made in the past 30 years in the treatment of breast cancer. About how we now have targeted therapies for some kinds of breast cancer that ideally reduce treatment toxicity and effect on healthy cells, and people are living longer with metastatic disease. Unfortunately, these advancements should have an asterisk attached, because the progress made in breast cancer treatment also exacerbates the differences between how White and Black people experience the disease in the United States.
For decades, it was believed that White women developed the disease more often than Black women, but when mammogram access began improving for Black women, the data reflected that incidence rates are actually very close. We’ve also learned that Black men are more likely to be diagnosed with breast cancer than White men. Targeted treatments have been developed for estrogen receptor (ER) positive and HER2 positive breast cancer– but not for triple negative breast cancer, which is more likely to affect women of color, particularly African American women, than White women. In Virginia, Black women are more likely to get a mammogram at least every two years compared to White women, but are still more likely to die from the disease. Being that we exist in a state among the top ten for Black population, and given Virginia’s fraught history, the Virginia Breast Cancer Foundation must address the health disparities that exist for Black people and breast cancer.
VBCF discusses these health disparities during our Stay Abreast presentations to ensure that all audiences are aware of them. At the grassroots level, staff and volunteers frequently work with Black churches, sororities/fraternities, and Historically Black Colleges and Universities to give Stay Abreast presentations, attend health fairs, or even just share our informational materials. At the “grasstops” level, we work with the VCU Massey Office of Health Equity and Disparities Research and the Cancer Action Coalition of Virginia (CACV) on addressing cancer health disparities in the Black and other underserved communities. That being said, if you know of things we should be doing or groups we should be a part of in order to better advocate for Black people with breast cancer, please let us know. We have also taken the Tigerlily Pledge as an organization, so please help hold us accountable!
If you want to learn more about how breast cancer affects Black people, here are some recent articles/videos we have shared recently, and some other sources we use for our work.
- Cancer in the Age of COVID: Black Breast Cancer Survivors Speak Out
- Caring for Yourself and Your Emotions as a Black Woman with Breast Cancer
- Participation by minority racial, ethnic groups in NCI-funded trials nearly doubles in 20 years
- CDC: Breast Cancer Rates Among Black Women and White Women
- Sisters Network
Photo by National Cancer Institute on Unsplash.
