The Westside Gazette

PAGE 14 • OCTOBER 10 - OCTOBER 16, 2024
Deeply Rooted
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Black Women Are Paying the
Price For Systemic Racism
in Breast Cancer Care
By Dr. Bayo Curry-
Winchell
As women, we often hear
about the importance of breast
cancer screening and early
detection. However, for Black
women, despite significant
improvements in breast
cancer care, a disturbing gap
persists in outcomes between
Kena Betancur | Corbis News
By Annika Kim Constantino
(Source: CNBC)
(bongkarn - stock.adobe.
Black and White women:
systemic racism.
The role of systemic
racism and sexism cannot
be ignored in understanding
these disparities. Social
and economic factors, often
influenced by systemic
racism, can create barriers
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Ambassador
Nancy G. Brinker
Spearheads
Local Nonprofit’s
Efforts to Provide
No Cost Breast
Cancer Diagnostic
Screenings to
Nearly 100,000
Underserved
Women in South
Florida
Submitted by Debbie
Abrams
WEST PALM BEACH,
FL,-– As breast cancer
awareness month begins,
Promise Fund, a South
Florida based non-profit
founded by Ambassador
Nancy G. Brinker, is
reaching out to the tens of
thousands of women in Palm
Beach, Broward and Martin
Counties who are uninsured,
under insured or have limited
or no access to healthcare.
The organization, founded
in 2018, is dedicated to
increasing survivorship from
breast and cervical cancer by
providing guided support and
access to screenings, as well
as early detection, treatment,
and beyond.
A study out yesterday by
the American Cancer Society
shows the incidence of breast
cancer has risen over the last
decade, particularly among
those under 50. According to
the study, Black women are
least likely to be diagnosed
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Healthy Returns: Pfizer pulls Sickle Cell Disease
drug from markets – here’s why it matters
A version of this article first appeared in CNBC’s Healthy Returns newsletter,
which brings the latest health-care news straight to your inbox. Subscribe here to
receive future editions.
Hello and happy Tuesday! Today, we’re unpacking a shocking move from Pfizer.
The pharmaceutical giant last week announced it would voluntarily withdraw its
sickle cell disease therapy, Oxbryta, from worldwide markets — to the surprise of doctors,
patients and investors.
Getty Images
Here’s why the drug is important: Oxbryta is one of at least six treatments for the inherited blood disorder. The drug first won
accelerated approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in 2019, which requires further trials to confirm its benefits to
patients.
Oxbryta was one of the centerpieces of Pfizer’s $5.4 billion acquisition of Global Blood Therapeutics in 2022.
Sickle cell disease causes red blood cells to become misshapen half-moons that get stuck inside blood vessels, which can
restrict blood flow and cause what are known as pain crises. It impacts roughly 100,000 people in the U.S., many of whom are
Black, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The company on Wednesday said the decision to withdraw Oxbryta was based on data showing a higher risk of deaths and
complications in patients treated with the once-daily pill. In a release, Pfizer said the “totality of clinical data” on Oxbryta now
indicates that its overall benefit “no longer outweighs the risk” in the patient population for which the drug is approved.
Twin babies who died alongside
their mother in Georgia are
youngest-known Hurricane
Helene victims
from the Front Page
father she would heed his advice to shelter in the bathroom
with her month-old babies until the storm passed.
Minutes later, she was no longer answering her family’s
calls.
One of her brothers dodged fallen trees and downed power
lines to check on her later that day, and he could barely bear to
tell his father what he saw.
A large tree had crashed through the roof, crushing Kobe
and causing her to fall on top of infant sons Khyzier and
Khazmir. All three were found dead.
“I’d seen pictures when they were born and pictures every
day since, but I hadn’t made it out there yet to meet them,”
Obie Williams told The Associated Press days after the storm
ravaged eastern Georgia. “Now I’ll never get to meet my
grandsons. It’s devastating.”
The babies, born Aug. 20, are the youngest known victims
of a storm that had claimed 200 lives across Florida, Georgia,
Tennessee, Virginia and the Carolinas as of Thursday. Among
the other young victims are a 7-year-old girl and a 4-year-old
boy from about 50 miles (80 kilometers) south in Washington
County, Georgia.
In the elder Williams’ home city of Augusta, 30 miles (48
kilometers) east of his daughter’s home in Thomson, power
lines stretched along the sidewalks, tree branches blocked
the roads and utility poles lay cracked and broken. The debris
left him trapped in his neighborhood near the South Carolina
border for a little over a day after the storm barreled through.
Kobe, a single mother nursing newborns, had told her
family it wasn’t possible for her to evacuate with such young
babies, her father said.
Many of his 14 other children are still without power in their
homes across Georgia. Some have sought refuge in Atlanta,
and others have traveled to Augusta to see their father and
mourn together.
They are waiting for the bodies to be released by the county
coroner and for roads to be cleared before arranging a funeral.
Williams described his daughter as a lovable, social and
strong young woman. She always had a smile on her face and
loved to make people laugh, he said.
She was studying to be a nursing assistant but had taken
time off from school to give birth to her sons.
“That was my baby,” her father said. “And everybody loved
her.”
As part of that move,
Pfizer is also discontinuing all
studies and access programs
related to the treatment.
The FDA on Saturday urged
healthcare professionals to
stop prescribing Oxbryta.
The agency also said patients
and caregivers should contact
their healthcare professional
about stopping the drug and
starting another treatment
option.
European regulators on
Thursday also said patients
in trials had higher rates of
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