(AllHipHop News) Mathew Knowles, father of singers Beyonce and Solange, wants to “save lives, especially in the black community” by opening up on his battle with breast cancer.
The entertainment mogul and former manager of Destiny’s Child went public with his diagnosis on the first day of Breast Cancer Awareness Month last October and, after undergoing a mastectomy, is now free of the disease.
Speaking to People, Mathew shared he started working with Invitae, a genetic testing company, at the start of this year to encourage everyone to get tested, insisting: “If you’re ahead of the curve, then your outcome will be, most of the time, great… I’m a living example.”
While the company tests men and women, it’s male breast cancer he’s passionate about raising awareness of. While men make up just a tiny portion of the breast cancer diagnoses each year, they die at a disproportionately higher rate than women – in part because their cancer is often found later.
The former medical sales executive also wants to raise awareness of the BRCA2 mutation, admitting that, “All those years I’ve been in diagnostic imaging, I had never heard the word BRCA before.”
“A whole lot has to change in the education of men about breast cancer,” he insisted, adding that black men are diagnosed with breast cancer at a 52% higher rate than white men.
“I want to save lives, especially in the Black community,” Mathew said.