By Jayla Burton, Program Manager
People living with breast cancer, their caretakers, and breast cancer activists know that breast cancer is political.
We’re sending our letter to the Biden-Harris administration, urging them to end breast cancer through systemic interventions that will address the root causes of the disease and produce broad public health benefits.
By adding your name to our card to the administration, you’ve helped make breast cancer a priority for this new administration. You can read our full letter to the Biden-Harris team here.
Here are some of the highlights of our official statement:
Breast cancer must be addressed through a racial justice and health equity lens. According to the U.S Center for Disease Control, Black women are 40% more likely to die from the disease than white women. Latina women are 20% more likely to die from breast cancer than white women diagnosed at a similar age and stage. These disparities are rooted in systemic racism and discriminatory policies and practices in our healthcare systems, our environmental practices and policies, and in our economic systems that result in disproportionate harm for communities of color.
The focus on immutable breast cancer risk factors such as gender, aging, or inherited genetics will never alter the incidence rates of breast cancer. There is a growing body of evidence linking toxic chemicals to this disease. In 2010, the President’s Cancer Panel reported that “the true burden of environmentally induced cancer has been grossly underestimated [and] . . . the American people—even before they are born—are bombarded continually with myriad combinations of these dangerous exposures.”
As the watchdog for the breast cancer movement, BCAction will continue to hold the Biden-Harris administration accountable, and urge them to take on breast cancer by addressing systemic racism, increasing transparency and accountability in our regulatory agencies, focusing on primary prevention, ensuring more effective and less toxic treatments, and enacting universal healthcare.
Thank you for taking action with us and holding our leaders accountable. Members like you are fearless, unapologetic activists who are ready to speak truth to power, and that goes all the way to the top.