November 15th, 2021
Posted in News
Being There is delighted to announce that our trustee, Dr Minaxi Desai, has received a prestigious award from The British Association for Cytopathology (BAC) and commissioned 10 awards in her name to mark her 70th birthday and her tireless efforts in cervical cancer prevention.
The BAC Mina Desai award will be presented annually for the next 10 years to an invited guest speaker at the BAC annual scientific meeting for outstanding contributions to the field of cytopathology. The first award was presented to Mina Desai herself after her guest lecture at BAC ASM on 15th October 2021.
Mina’s family kept the knowledge of the award secret for a year during the pandemic year which was also her 70th birthday.
Dr Desai was a consultant at The Christie Hospital and Manchester Royal infirmary and has worked tirelessly for more than 30 years for the prevention of cervical cancer in UK and globally in countries such as, Africa and India.
Mina has previously been honoured with a CBE from Her Majesty, The Queen for services to women’s health and was also selected to run with the Olympic Torch at the UK Olympics.
Dr Desai said about her award:
“I attended our professional conference of British Association for Cytopathology on 15th October in Nottingham. I was asked to give a guest lecture on my cervical cancer prevention work in India after my retirement in 2017. I got a big surprise from the executive committee and council. They gave me life membership and an award for my outstanding contribution to Cytopathology. I also received flowers for my belated 70th birthday. I was speechless and my eyes were full of tears.
My family knew about this since 2020 but kept it secret. I don’t know what else they are hiding from me!
I am very grateful to BAC for giving me this honour.
I hope to go to the rural areas of the developing world to spread the world and this award gives me strength to work towards WHO’s goal to eliminate this cancer.”
Cervical cancer is currently the only cancer where there is an effective vaccine and the World Health Organisation’s target is to 2030 to eliminate it globally by 2030.
We at Being There would like to congratulate Mina on her award. We are very proud of her and her achievements and honoured to have her on our board.