The American University in Dubai (AUD) Health Center, in collaboration with its student chapter, entitled, 'Heal,' the AUD International Aid (AIA) Club, and the AUD Live and Give Student Organization, organized the University's annual Breast Cancer Awareness Campaign on Sunday, the 10th of October, 2010. The campaign took place on the University's campus with the induction of the Pink Walkathon, Book Drive and Bake Sale, the proceeds of which will go to the Red Crescent towards Breast Cancer research.
Nelly Halabi, AUD's Health Center Director, and the campaign's curator and supervisor, comments:
"The AUD Breast Cancer Campaign is rather an annual humanitarian ritual undertaken by the AUD community to manifest its support for Breast Cancer patients and uphold the ongoing initiatives carried out by the UAE Ministry of Health for the sake of human welfare." She adds, "Some of the University's community members, who have lost, or are currently witnessing the suffering of, a relative, friend, or a beloved one, due to breast cancer, have attended the event to show their support via donating money without buying any of the displayed campaign's items; to them, they want to give without receiving as the sentiments and thoughts that have accompanied some of them, who had their share of experience, in one way or another, with the disease, supersede any tangible worth of the items put on sale to raise the proceeds." "It is deeply touching to see the AUD faculty, staff and students unite in the name of such a noble humanitarian cause as breast cancer may affect the lives of many, and raising awareness about, and funds for, such cause is one of the utmost benevolent acts anyone could ever do for humankind," she concludes.
Student organizers also conducted other fund-raising activities, such as selling flowers, balloons, wrist rubber bands and T-shirts for the upcoming Burjuman Walkathon, set to take place on the 29th of this month, to raise funds for this humanitarian cause. They even designed and produced collateral materials to announce the event on campus and distributed awareness brochures highlighting precautionary health measures related to breast cancer and the different methods of self-examination for the early detection of the disease with the sole aim of raising awareness and saving lives.
