A new mobile cancer screening van will soon travel Kentucky roads from Paducah to Pikeville. Governor Steve Beshear and First Lady Jane Beshear participated in Friday’s unveiling at Keeneland.
The ‘Horses and Hope’ mobile unit, paid for with $1 million in private donations, can screen for seven different types of cancer. Kentucky Cancer Program Director Connie Sorrell has been involved with mobile mammographies for years. She’s confident the fully equipped screening van will save lives. “I will be out weekly and people will come up to me and say ‘you saved my life,’” said Sorrell. “All you have to do is hear stories like that you know that we’re gonna be out and be able to make a difference in Kentuckians.”
Sorrell says the ‘Horses and Hope’ mobile unit will be on the road every day. Jane Beshear told those in attendance how screenings helped her husband and Lieutenant Governor Crit Luallen become cancer survivors. “I want to make sure that all Kentuckians have the same kind of access to screenings that they did,” said Beshear. “And this van is gonna do that.”
Once fully equipped, the vehicle will provide free or significantly reduced screenings in underserved areas across the Commonwealth.
Governor Beshear says there is a direct line between poor health and almost every challenge that the state faces. He says that includes poverty, unemployment, lags in education attainment, substance abuse, or crime.
