Posted on April 26, 2021

By Krystal Redman, Executive Director

BCAction’s 2020 Think Before You Pink® campaign changed how the National Cancer Institute (NCI) communicates about breast cancer.

This will impact how breast cancer is addressed across the nation going forward. The changes we advocated for pushed the NCI to include critical information on the link between environmental exposures and breast cancer on their breast cancer prevention webpage for patients, and we need your help to continue this type of ground-breaking work.

There is so much more to collectively learn and do, especially in regard to how chemical exposures most directly affect under-resourced communities and communities of color, who are disproportionately impacted by racially biased industrial zoning, and decades of racist urban planning practices. That’s why we are a partner on two ground-breaking studies that could reshape practices to protect all people from these toxic exposures.

But to make these profound changes we need to raise $25,000 this Spring.

Five people holding signs about what health justice means to them. Text reads Donate Today, Spring Fundraising Goal: $25,000.

Breast Cancer Action is a proud partner on two studies right now:

  • The Public Health Institute’s Child Health and Development Study’s ongoing research, Linking Neighborhood and Individual Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) to Breast Cancer, aims to shine new light on whether the adversity of living in communities burdened by policies of segregation and toxic exposures contributes to biological changes in age of menarche and breast density, and ultimately, in breast cancer diagnosis. This multi-generational study will help organizers and policy-makers gain new understanding of how factors such as neighborhood, income level, stress level, and environmental exposure affect breast cancer risk.
  • The GRAton PEsticides (GRAPE) Research Project is investigating the impact of pesticide exposure and air contamination on Graton, a city in California’s wine country. This work will contribute to the growing body of evidence that links exposure to certain synthetic chemicals to health harms including breast cancer, which disproportionately affect people of color working in agricultural communities like Graton.
We need your support to continue our work on these critical issues.

People living with breast cancer are the subject matter experts. As breast cancer activists and advocates, it is our job to offer our unique and people-centered approach to bringing together researchers and the people with lived experience of breast cancer. By making these connections, we drive forward the systemic change needed to address and end this public health crisis.

To continue to do so, we need your support to fund this critical work.