Rosa Meneses is a breast cancer patient and initiator of the Philippine Breast Cancer Network (PBCN). During the Second World Conference on Breast Cancer Advocacy, she presented her speech during the plenary session entitled: "Breast Cancer Advocacy Efforts from Around the World".
Warmest Greetings!
Firstly, kindly accept my deepest appreciation from way beneath my bare chest for granting me this rare opportunity to share with you how "modernization" has been affecting the lives of my people.
Our government is more concerned with taxes from business than with the health of our people for whom the taxes are meant to benefit. Our industries are only concerned with sales and profit and not with the way they produce and manage their waste. Our schools are more concerned with supplying both government and industry with graduates who will continue these concerns and not change things. We then have a situation in the Philippines wherein health and environment are not priorities but simply "lip-service" concerns.
In my country today, glaring signs of a deteriorating public health and the environment are already evident and yet negligible efforts are being made by our government and research institutions. The overemphasis on economic growth is resulting in a most alarming health situation - where my people are unknowingly being led to believe that all the advances in technology and communications will deliver a better tomorrow. My country may probably now have one of the most polluted lake, river and bay in the entire world.
Where there is being observed an increasing incidence of breast cancer, there surely are many other diseases not far behind.
The urban center of the Philippines, Metro Manila, is fast becoming a highly polluted environment to live in. With a dense population of no less than 10 million, commercial, industrial and residential areas overlap resulting in a chaotic traffic situation continuously emitting large volumes of carbon dioxide. From above, you can see a massive haze hovering above the city - thick and impenetrable, refusing to go away. The Manila Bay has experienced several oil spills aside from the regular dumping of solid and liquid waste from manufacturing and industrial concerns. One company alone, the largest tuna canning factory, dumps as much as ten tons of scum every night in Manila Bay, thus probably making it one of the most polluted bays in the entire world.. The Manila Bay area has periodically experienced overnight fish kills and the so-called "red tide" which has contaminated a very popular clam delicacy called "tahong".
In Pasig City, the average annual age-standardized incidence rate for breast cancer was 38.3/100,00 five years ago. Although without any new figures, I strongly suspect that it is now much higher. In this city runs the Pasig River - probably one of the most polluted river in the entire world because along its banks are situated since World War II, many factories and industries which have been simply dumping most if not all of their waste into the river. Furthermore, the most of the sewage system of Metro Manila is emptied into the same river.
In Parañaque City, we have observed an increasing number of breast cancer victims and highly suspect the fumes from aircraft fuselage due to the presence of the Manila International & Domestic Airports. Furthermore, the city is beside Laguna Lake - probably one of the most polluted lakes in the world. This lake is the septic tank of Metro Manila and two neighboring provinces. All industrial, residential and agricultural waste are directed to this body of water. The country's major food corporations dump their waste here with one company alone, the largest piggery in the country continuously pouring most of its manure into this body of water.
In Quezon City, a mostly residential area, the increasing incidence of breast cancer may be significantly caused by the huge open dumpsite of garbage ironically situated very near the Philippine Congress where one will always smell the stench specially in the early morning.
The provinces are not exempt.
In Pampanga, particularly Angeles City, it has been recorded that the number of breast cancer cases and deaths due to breast cancer have each increased more than 200% in just two years time. From 149 cases in 1996 to 502 cases in 1998 and from 188 deaths in 1996 to 603 deaths in 1998. We highly suspect the undetermined volume of highly toxic waste left behind by Clark Air Field, a major US military installation which was used during the Vietnam War.
A small town called, Guihulngan in the province of Negros Oriental which is 116 kms north of the capital city, has no traffic because there are no vehicles to speak of and there are no factories because it is an agricultural area. But why does it have the highest incidence of breast cancer in that province? The townsfolk suspect their drinking water but cannot say why. I found out that their town is completely surrounded by mining operations where chemicals are being dumped into their rivers. One fourth of the province is used for mining operations while one half of the entire province has been used for sugar cane plantations for decades where extensive chemical methods of production are being practiced. The farmers have also reported farm animals to have fallen ill after drinking from the contaminated river.
In the Muslim Province of Sulu, the people eat mostly deep sea fish and do not eat pork. Furthermore, they go on an annual religious fasting. Their island province is located farthest south from Manila keeping it a great distance and far from "civilization" and they have no major industries or factories. What then accounts for the growing incidence of breast cancer in that far flung island? We suspect that previous dumping of large volumes of toxic waste from Toxic Dump Ships from US and Europe in the South Philippine Seas may be one of the major causes.
The environmental risk factors of breast cancer are rapidly coming out. In the Ilocos area, there have been reports of domestic animals such as a faceless cat, a pig with three legs, a goat with five legs, a carabao with unusually long horns, etc. Recently in Marikina where our government prides itself with its Clean River Project, thousands of fish suddenly surfaced, grasping for air until they all eventually just floated dead. Recently an infant in Samar was born with no legs and no arms. I could go on and on.
The government-run National Power Corporation currently has plans of retiring 34 old thermal power plants nationwide but refuses to divulge its disposal program. The considerable amounts of PCB waste anticipated from the decommissioning of these old transformers present a great danger.
The Mining Act of 1995 has increased foreign intrusions into the ancestral lands of our cultural minorities and will surely cause havoc in our already devastated mountains - denuded forests due to rampant illegal logging hasn't taken enough toll, our Department on Environment and Natural Resources has not learned anything at all.
As if local risk factors were not enough, the Philippines is fast becoming an easy market for foreign products which easily receive government approval. The great percentage of our dairy and meat products now come from Australia and New Zealand - ironically where the incidence of breast cancer is the third highest in the entire world. The dairy and meat industry is presently being questioned in the United States and Canada because of recent findings linking IGF-1 (insulin growth factor) to cancer. Several foreign firms are in the process of installing huge incinerators nationwide to burn all the garbage mountains. One particular firm is from Australia, a country which I understand does not permit incinerators.
Procter and Gamble (USA) is now massively marketing "FIT", a supposed natural rinse of fruits and vegetables but has refused to respond to any concern and inquiry on the product's safety - I understand it is not available in the US or any other country for that matter. What gives my country the great privilege of being chosen to have this product? Are Filipino more health conscious than the Americans, or are our fruits and vegetables dirtier than theirs? It is most fearful to think that our people are being used as human experiments.
Monsanto (USA), the controversial corporation greatly endorsed by US President Bill Clinton, has a very great presence in our country and is a major chemical supplier of our local food industry, manufacturing, pharmaceutical and agricultural sectors. I am most happy to have learned that the European Community has been actively opposing Genetic Engineering being peddled by this monstrous company. They are also the producers of ASPARTAME - the controversial artificial sweetener which is suspected of directly causing serious health problems.
If a study on the direct links of the environment and breast cancer where to be done, there would be no other ideal place in the world to select than the Philippines. It would be so easy to study and establish the link because of the black and white situation where the evidences are so evident.
Getting afflicted with breast cancer in the Philippines is like getting lost in your own hometown. The women population are not only generally ignorant of the disease but they also suffer the gravest consequences on their human bodies. Given a huge backdrop of an indifferent, fatalistic culture and a passive government bureaucracy as far as breast cancer is concerned this side of the world, an indescribable desperation is what faces a would-be victim. During the 1997 World Conference on Breast Cancer in Kingston, Ontario, Canada, I found myself the only breast cancer delegate in attendance from my country- at that time, a five-month mastectomy victim, who traveled great distance in search of an answer. Was it because I was the only woman with breast cancer in my country?
Responding to the call for GLOBAL ACTION TOWARDS THE ERADICATION OF BREAST CANCER, the Philippine Breast Cancer Network was formalized in October of the same year and the first ever Philippine Conference on Breast Cancer was held, exactly a year later on the October, 1998. For the very first time ever, some two hundred breast cancer fighters, relatives, advocates, physicians, researchers, environmentalists, supporters and volunteers gathered in a most historic event which has suddenly changed the landscape of breast cancer in the Philippines.
Since the start of this year, we have began our information and awareness campaign by conducting several lectures and symposiums. In January, the PBCN was part of two forums, one for about 20 health practitioners and the other for some 30 environmentalists. On January 30, we staged a symposium for some 250 urban poor women. Last month, the PBCN conducted a 2-day lecture in a remote town of the southern island of Negros Oriental for 60 farmers and a lecture session for 40 participants during the 3rd Wholistic Healing & Arts Festival in Quezon City On February 25, we held a symposium for some 100 public school elementary teachers in the City of Pasig. This coming March 27, we are scheduled to hold the next out-of-town symposium in Bataan. On May, the PBCN we will be staging the first ever mountain hike of breast cancer victims in an effort to draw nationwide attention as well as raise funds.
Ever since the PBCN was established, we have received numerous phone calls and mail seeking various advises regarding breast cancer, most particular therapy. We have been visited by numerous patients who have undergone mastectomies, chemotherapy and radiation but who all still feel that they are only worsening. The reason for most is that the doctors they went to were usually general surgeons who practiced mastectomy as a preventive approach, even for Stage I cases. Worst, they also administered the chemotherapy and just switched from one drug to another if the patient was not responding. This has led to very poor compliance where many have not been able to finish the required 6-cycles of chemotherapy. In all of them, they were not prepared nor informed on their options as well as the risks involved.
The situation is most glaring among women of poor economic status and most would rather not know if they have the disease - for what good is knowing if they cannot afford treatment. Thus, incidence reports do not include the many poor women who simply die of breast cancer without medical care as they remain unreported. Most often, the cause of their deaths are stated of unknown causes.
If it will be necessary for single-breasted women to come forward and break the deafening silence and apathy to the long and silent suffering of women who nurtured their children with their whole bodies, then there can be no better time to take action. The Breast Cancer Movement in the Philippines has now began. If the PBCN is been able to do so much without serious funding, imagine what it could do if it did.
It is my hope that my trip here to your country may be able to raise the needed funds not only for our organizational needs but also for the many projects we have lined up such as the following:
Let me now state that the greatest risk of getting breast cancer in the future is being born today in a developing country. The greatest risk of not surviving breast cancer today is being a woman in the Philippines. It is not for us to complete the task of global eradication of breast cancer. But, we must begin it. What we begin, let us finish.
I pray that all the spirits of all women of the world who have lost their battle with breast cancer descend upon us and lift our work to where it truly belongs - up above the skies, so clear and great - so that mankind may finally realize that we are all part of nature - and that our future rests on the future of nature.
I ask you all to support the Philippine Breast Cancer Network in whatever way you best can.
With much respect and affection from way deep beneath the bottom of my bare chest, I am with you,
Thank you so very much.
