The Eastern Region recorded 117 breast cancer cases in 2025, as against 150 in 2024, the Regional Director of the Ghana Health Service (GHS), Dr Damien Punguyire, has stated.
Similarly, in 2023, the region recorded 289 cases, and as of June this year, the cases have so far reduced to 99.
This was due to an education campaign the region has been undertaking to educate women in the various communities in the region.
Awareness month
Dr Damien Punguyire made this known when he addressed health professionals at a regional launch of the breast cancer awareness campaign month in Koforidua yesterday on the theme: "Early Action, Better Outcome".
Doctors and nurses at the breast cancer launch in Koforidua
The event was attended by some selected health professionals such as doctors and nurses in the region as well as breast cancer survivors.
He said the campaign was intended to cover all 33 districts and municipalities within the region to screen women with breast cancer as part of awareness creation of the disease.
Wake-up call
Dr Punguyire stated that the cases were a wake-up call that breast cancer remained a significant public health concern and must be taken seriously.
He said recorded cases in the region had reduced from 289 to 99 in three years, and that the more worrying situation had been that fewer women were being screened, examined and diagnosed.
According to the Regional Health Director, distance and cost were not the only things that kept women from breast cancer checks but rather fear, shame and wrong beliefs kept them away.
Early detection, Dr Punguyire further indicated, was key to treatment and cure and, therefore, warned that delay in diagnosis and subsequent treatment could cause more deaths.
He also advised women to immediately inform their spouses when they found any abnormalities in their breasts and also encouraged men to be supportive of women with the condition.
"Breast cancer is the most common cancer among women in the world and in Ghana, too many women go to hospital only when the disease is already advanced,” he said.
Herbal medicine
The Eastern Regional Coordinator in charge of Non-communicable Diseases (NCDs), Dr Abigail Doduwah Sackey, cautioned breast cancer patients against the use of herbal medicine for treatment of the disease and advised them to seek early medical care at the regional hospital.
The disease, she indicated, was not caused by spiritual affliction.
"In my medical practice, I have seen herbal medicine working when it comes to malaria; I have seen people using herbal medicine to treat even skin diseases.
"I have not seen anyone successfully using herbal medicine to treat breast cancer", Dr Sackey stated.
Prayers, Dr Sackey stated, were necessary and women suffering from breast cancer must first visit health facilities for holistic treatment of the disease.
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