Image via National Breast Center Foundation
This month you may notice some painted angel wings around Alexandria. These wings are part of the National Breast Center Foundation’s new Angel Wing Challenge associated with the annual Walk to Bust Breast Cancer, which looks a little different this year.
As a result of precautions for the pandemic, the walk has been moved online. Each team is now walking independently anytime between Oct. 1 and Oct. 25.
Oct. 25 is the official walk day and the National Breast Center Foundation will be broadcasting a program through their social media channels, featuring meditation, dancing, speeches, and pre-recorded and live footage from walks.
The National Breast Center Foundation, located in Alexandria, works to educate people about breast cancer and treatment, provide access to care, and implement screening and treatment technology.
The walk is the organizations single largest fundraiser for the year, and with it becoming more difficult for people to go out and receive care either because of lost income or health coverage, there is a greater need for assistance in getting care.
“The need is really huge and growing,” said Executive Director Martha Carucci. “And it’s very hard in times of COVID to go out and raise money.”
They are seeing an increase in women on waiting lists to receive mammograms. Their partner Nueva Vida, which helps Latinas through cancer diagnoses in the D.C. area, has seen their wait list of women seeking mammograms go from 30 to about 300.
The list has grown in part because there are less preventative scans being offered, and even when things have opened up people have been afraid of go to get screened out of concerns about COVID.
Carucci recently head from founder Dr. David C. Weintritt that for every month the U.S. puts off preventative screenings because of COVID there is a risk of missing 30,000 breast cancer diagnoses.
“We have committed to use the funds that we have raised since COVID-19 to help women (and men) who have lost their jobs and insurance coverage to get proper screening and treatment for breast cancer,” the foundation stated in a recent press release.
Last year the walk was about to raise $106,000, which went directly towards helping low-income and uninsured women get treatments and screening for breast cancer they need. With the money they raised last year they got the Mammovan, a mobile mammography vehicle that can screen up to 20 women at a time. It costs $5,400 a day to use.
The money was also used to help women at Nueva Vida and Neighborhood Health, a non-profit with the mission of equitable health care for Alexandria, Arlington and Fairfax County, get needed follow-up care.
Business would typically be a big sponsor for the walk, but with recent economic hits many businesses have taken the foundation thought of a new way to involve business and support them as well.
As they created the Angel Wing Challenge. The wings will be moved around to different businesses in Alexandria and the challenge is for someone to take a photo with the wings, tag the business and Walk to Bust Breast Cancer in hashtags, register or donate, and challenge five friend to do the same.
The wings have been a big feature of the walk in past years. The wings were painted by a participant battling cancer and have been used as a way for people to honor those they are walk for who have died from breast cancer.
Some participating business in the Angel Wing Challenge will feature pink breast cancer awareness items.
On day two of the fundraiser, they are 90 percent of the way to the goal of raising $50,000.
There are QR codes on the wings for registration, or you can go to www.givegab.com/campaigns/walk-to-bust-cancer-virtual to register and donate.
