Yoplait & Soraya Team Up to Launch Breast Cancer Education &, Awareness Program.

Yoplait announced a plan to provide important bilingual breast health information to medically underserved women in Los Angeles and Orange County. The new multicultural program, Yoplait Save Lids to Save Lives SI Se Puede!, will launch September 24 in Ralphs and Food 4 Less stores. Yoplait SI Se Puede! Days will include free bilingual breast health information and personal appearances from Latin singer-songwriter Soraya. Soraya will help promote the life-saving message of early detection in an effort to help reduce breast cancer incidence and mortality rates among Hispanic women living in Southern California.

After losing her mother, grandmother and aunt to the disease, and then personally fighting an aggressive battle with Stage 3 breast cancer, singer-songwriter Soraya, 34, is back on the top of Billboard’s “Hot Latin Tracks” chart with her new #1 single “Casi.” Through “Casi,” Soraya shares the emotions of her cancer diagnosis and three-year battle. During the Yoplait SI Se Puede! Days, Soraya will help distribute a bilingual breast health information kit provided by Yoplait and the Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation. The kit includes a bilingual breast self-examination card, breast health facts and myths, and a personal message from Soraya. In addition to participating in the Yoplait SI Se Puede! Days, Soraya will also be performing at the September 28th Komen Orange County Race for the Cure(R).

“I never set out to be an activist,” Soraya says. “But once I started seeing the impact I could have, and how my story was being used in other countries to educate women, I knew it was important to embrace what was happening to me, take the strength from it and help others. It is important for women to know that they have to take responsibility for their own lives. If you are a woman over the age of 20, you need to have the self-esteem to check yourself for breast cancer. As a Hispanic woman it is even more important to promote positive breast health to these often underserved women. Yoplait understands the overwhelming need for breast cancer awareness and education within minority communities and is working hand-in-hand with the communities to help make a difference.”

According to the Komen Foundation, breast cancer is the leading cause of cancer deaths among all women ages 40-59. In Orange County and Los Angeles, one out of eight women will be diagnosed with breast cancer during her lifetime. When breast cancer is detected while still confined to the breast, a patient’s five-year survival rate is more than 95 percent. Unfortunately, in the United States, only 38 percent of Latina women ages 40 and older say they have received a mammogram in the last two years. Latina women experience higher breast cancer mortality rates than their Caucasian counterparts due, in large part, to later-stage diagnosis and treatment. For instance, the five-year survival rate for non-Hispanic White women with breast cancer is 85 percent while for Hispanic women it is 76 percent.

For more information at http://www.komen.org/bse