About us

Breast Cancer Action Quebec is a feminist health organization that has been dedicated to breast cancer prevention for over 30 years, with a particular focus on the environmental factors linked to the disease. BCAQ works on the problem of toxic substances present in everyday products and is concerned with environmental issues that have an impact on health.

Our prevention, advocacy and public education activities focus on breast cancer issues, and over the years we have diversified our actions and approaches to address social inequalities in health, prevention education for youth and the fight against environmental racism.

Our intersectional feminist approach implies that we acknowledge the way people’s social identities can overlap, creating compounding experiences of discrimination. At BCAQ we are committed to moving marginalized people’s voices to the centre.

An anti-racist stance is strongly embedded in our vision meaning that we look critically at health and environment policy and practices to identify how systemic racism leads to individuals, groups or communities, because of their membership in specific ethnic groups or communities, being treated differently to their detriment.

In September 1991, five Montreal women with breast cancer—Carolyn Gibson Badger, Sharon Batt, Kathleen Glass, Joan Piper and Margaret Waller—joined forces to end their isolation and to move the disease from the private to the public sphere. They formed a group to raise awareness of breast cancer issues, to advocate for better diagnosis, treatment and care; and to give women a voice in decisions about treatment, services, health policy and research.

At BCAM’s first public meeting, in April 1992, sixty women and reporters crowded into a small church hall and BCAM was launched publicly. These pioneers went on to organize conferences, demonstrations, and a range of public education events with the goal of putting the focus on prevention and the link between toxic substances in our environment and this disease.

Twenty three years later, members voted to change the organization’s name from Breast Cancer Action Montreal to Breast Cancer Action Quebec to reflect the broader reach of the organization.

Most women today have contact with at least one woman affected by breast cancer. Concern about the disease has convinced a new generation of women to join the movement so that today, BCAQ benefits from a wide network of members, partners and collaborators.