A follow-up on the mobile clinic supported by Teck, which provides breast cancer screening for women in communities around Carmen de Andacollo.
Today, breast cancer remains one of the leading causes of death among women in Chile. So in 2014, in a move to increase early—and potentially life-saving—detection efforts, the Arturo López Pérez Foundation came up with a way to help make the test more accessible for women in remote areas: a mobile mammography clinic.
The initiative was supported by Chile’s Bureau of Health, and an extension of the program into the Coquimbo Region of Chile and the communities surrounding Carmen de Andacollo Operations (CDA) was made possible through community investment funding from Teck.
“This health issue affects so many women in Chile,” says Manuel Novoa, General Manager, CDA. “It is crucial that these types of services are readily available so that women feel empowered to take a proactive approach to getting tested.”
The mobile clinic is now an important part of health screening in the region, and in 2016, another 350 women in the community benefited from the free mammograms, in addition to the more than 500 women already tested in years previous.
