By Vanessa Braithwaite

IN October, the month when the fight against the dreaded disease of cancer is recognised mostly through awareness programmes, Lindeners were more inclined to participate and get involved in this worldwide movement and evidence of this is everywhere. Businesses were decorated in pink, one in three people walking the streets was accessorised in something pink or was fully attired in pink; schools held cancer-awareness programmes; designers had dedicated the entire month to customised pink attire for clients and the list goes on.

How has such a movement grown? Well, much credit must be given to the first and one of two cancer-awareness NGOs in Linden: the Women on the Move Organisation. For 19 years, a group of seven women have dedicated selfless service in raising the much-needed awareness of a terminal illness that is on the upsurge today and has snatched many sons and daughters of the soil. The members, Camille Cummings, Judy Noel, Mayfield Taylor, Wonda Richmond, Janet Allen, Jacqueline Smith and Glenette Arthur, are the founders of the annual cancer awareness Walk, Run, Ride or Jog activity which was held on October 27. This event, deemed the climax of cancer-awareness events in Linden, has grown by leaps and bounds and today attracts thousands of persons who participate in the fitness activity.
Reminiscing on how it all started, Public Relations Officer of the group, Camille Cummings, said in 2000 a group of women attended a marathon cancer-awareness run in Georgetown in support of one of the team members who participated. She said they were all determined to host a similar event in Linden and that very year, it was held for the first time. The event initially featured women and took the form of a race on Republic Avenue. After some time, men started catching the fever and joined the event, then it grew to families, groups, organisations, businesses, etc.

After realising its immense growth, a decision was made to take the culmination of the event to the Mackenzie Sports Club ground, where a warm-down is done and a short programme with medical personnel giving talks on cancer is held. For the first time in 2018, a candlelight vigil was held some days. “That vigil was to allow that evening to be where the sentiments can be felt and the reflection…the candle lights represent those who would have passed; the programme features more of the spiritual healing of this thing, because we recognise there is a spiritual part of it, an emotional part of it, a social part of it, so we would have the religious leaders from across Linden there,” she said.

These activities, she said, are in support of all cancers and not only breast cancer and so while this year it is themed ‘pink all over’, but all of the various cancers will also be represented by its coloured balloon. The event also heavily focuses on survivors of cancer and those battling the later stages of the disease. “All through the years of our existence, we always considered the survivors, we started with small hampers, then tonics, then we spread to a little basket hampers and every year we are able to do more and more and are able to recognise and acknowledge more survivors. Those that cannot come out, we go to them. So at the end of the walk when everybody is gone home, our day is never finished; we go and visit all of our shut-in survivors,” Cummings related. Since last year’s event, she related that about five survivors have lost their battle to cancer.

During the year, the Women on the Move would participate in support-based activities such as home visits, contributions to wakes and funerals, etc. “Our concern is not only the survivors, we care about caregivers as well, because they are evenly important, because if they are not supported mentally and emotionally, it can beat them up terribly.”
Looking back, Cummings said she is happy with how much the fight against cancer has been recognised and how so many persons have been involved over the years, especially the youths. “This thing has no age, it has no race, no ethnicity, no creed, no gender. We know we cannot cure it, but we can fight it through awareness, because the more people are aware the more conscious they will become of rest, of their diet, of exercise and even their sex life; people will take cognisance of it so more and more people are being more careful about their choices in life,” she said