Goa Govt Launches 'Swasth Mahila, Swasth Goa' initiative for free breast cancer screening

By: WE Staff | Wednesday, 27 October 2021

Under the initiative ‘Swasth Mahila, Swasth Goa’, free breast cancer screening will be done for 1 lakh women in Goa, ensuring that 50 per cent of the age-eligible female population in the state is screened. The initiative is launched by international cricketing icon and humanitarian Yuvraj Singh’s YouWeCan Foundation in partnership with the SBI foundation, state government.

Under this initiative which is being funded by the Indian Institute of Banking and Finance, free breast cancer screening using ‘iBreast’ devices will be done for 1 lakh women in Goa over two years. For all positive cases, free treatment will be provided with the support of the Government of Goa.

Vishwajit P. Rane, Minister of Health, Women and Child Development launched the initiative at Goa Medical College and Hospital. Rane said, “This initiative is something I have been pushing for a very long time. During one of my visits to New York, I met Mihir Shah, Founder of UE Life Sciences, and we had a very long chat on taking forward this initiative with this support. I thank the YouWeCan foundation and SBI foundation for putting this initiative for us where we will be screening 1,00,000 women for breast cancer, Initially, we had aimed to screen 20,000 women, but it sounded unacceptable to me as it will hardly give any impact,” he added.

Regarding this initiative, Yuvraj Singh said, “Having fought through cancer myself, I firmly believe that this disease can be cured if it is detected early and given the correct treatment. And this is our mission with the ‘Swasth Mahila, Swasth Goa’ initiative. Women are the backbone of our society and we are committed to making every effort for their health and wellbeing.”

Under this initiative, the screening will be conducted at 35 Heatlh Centres across Goa. 10 iBreast devices will be deployed in North Goa and 10 in South Goa.