PinkDrive in full swing at Wanderers Taxi Rank

PinkDrive celebrations kicked-off at the Wanderers Taxi Rank on 6 February with a number of organisations including Green World, FutureLife and the Childhood Cancer Foundation coming on board.

Taxi governing body, Santaco, has, for the second time joined forces with the PinkDrive Breast Cancer Education and Awareness Foundation to launch a wider community broad-based awareness initiative in order to spread the motto ‘early detection saves lives’.

Santaco president, Philip Taaibosch sees the taxi industry’s role as being an especially critical one. “I think, in the main, it is a healthy society that we’re looking to build. As a major taxi operator in South Africa, we think it’s our responsibility to educate our drivers on health issues such as breast and prostate cancer. Breast cancer also affects men,” he said.

The taxi governing body has further earmarked the event as a concerted effort to reach out to the many commuters who make use of the taxi rank. Also important to Santaco, according to Taaibosch, is ensuring that the drivers are educated and encouraged to do better.

“This is an attempt at mind-changing and making our drivers aware that they’re part of society. We are talking to our drivers about such aspects as customer care, as it is through education that we can reduce the scourge of carnage on our roads. We have reduced it from 12 per cent to 10 per cent but still believe we can reduce it to 0 per cent,” added Taaibosch.

One such taxi driver, Zakhi Nkosi (35) has gladly taken the message to heart and lined up for the free prostate screening. “I’m here because testing is important and, as a driver, it is important to guard my health in order to commute passengers as safely as possible,” said Nkosi.

“I will also be spreading the word [to my colleagues] in the same way that our rank manager mobilised some of us who are here today.”

Febe Meyer, marketing manager at PinkDrive said, “PinkDrive has made a huge impact on South African communities at large, in that it has provided free mammogram testing to approximately 11 000 people and educated another 270 000.

“People are misinformed about the condition and being here today is an excellent opportunity to educate and inform people. Our healthcare professionals are trained and can communicate in vernacular to accommodate people who require being spoken to in a language they understand.”

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