Many cancer awareness campaigns focus on symptoms and early detection, but what we don’t talk about enough is how fear of the cost can stop people from even getting checked. When I first felt a small lump on my breast in early 2023, my biggest worry wasn’t what it might be, it was how much it would cost to find out. Like many Filipinos, I assumed that everything about cancer care in the Philippines was expensive, from consultations to hospital tests. That belief made me delay getting checked for months. I wish I had found something then that explained the real costs of breast cancer diagnostics, not to scare me, but to prepare me. To show that while treatment can be costly, getting checked and diagnosed doesn’t have to be out of reach. For over a year, I tried to ignore the lump, convincing myself it was probably just a cyst. I didn’t have pain or any other symptoms, so I waited, until one day, I noticed nipple bleeding. That was when I finally saw a doctor and learned that I had a rar...
Randomness starts with a cup of coffee and mild schizophrenia..