RAISING AWARENESS Black Mountain Mining’s PinkDrive mobile clinic assisted more than 600 people without medical aid
Northern Cape-based zinc/lead/silver/copper mining operation Black Mountain Mining (BMM) has assisted more than 600 vulnerable people without access to private healthcare to receive “life saving” early detection of breast, prostrate or testicular cancer as part of its efforts to support the PinkDrive cancer awareness and education campaign.
BMM is a unit of diversified natural resources company Vedanta.
With sponsorship from BMM, a PinkDrive mobile clinic stopped in the towns of Pofadder, Pella and Aggeneys, where local communities received mammograms, clinical breast examinations, pap smears, prostrate-specific antigen screening and health education talks covering HIV/Aids, tuberculosis and cancer.
During a feedback session with BMM, PinkDrive CEO and founder Noelene Kotschan described BMM PinkDrive as an “amazing caring organisation – not only for their staff, but their families and the local communities from which they draw their resources”.
The BMM PinkDrive campaign covered more than 4 000 km.
Representatives of local and provincial government and the South African National Aids Council were involved in the campaign.
PinkDrive oncologist Dr Sudeshen Naidoo says more than 100 000 South Africans are diagnosed with cancer every year, with the top five cancers being breast, cervical, colorectal and prostate cancers as well as Kaposi sarcoma.
She highlights that people living with HIV/Aids are at a higher risk of developing cervical cancer, Kaposi sarcoma and non-Hodgkin lymphoma, which are Aids-defining conditions.