Political Stakes of Cancer Podcast Series – Episode 2: We have to go so far – just for radiotherapy: therapeutic mobility, marginalisation and precarity for West African women with breast cancer in Mali and France

Podcast with Clémence Schantz, sociologist and midwife, Research Fellow at the Institut de Recherche pour le Développement (IRD) – Ceped UMR 196, in discussion with Thandeka Cochrane, Postdoctoral Research Associate, King’s College, London.

In this episode we speak with Clémence Schantz, midwife and sociologist, about her research with women diagnosed with breast cancer in Mali. Clémence tells us about the enormous struggles these women face to get vital radiotherapy treatment when their country has no radiotherapy machines. She follows them across the west African region as they seek to find treatment, and even all the way to France, where she tells harrowing tales of marginalised, undocumented migrants seeking life-giving care as their cancer proliferates. Outlining a project that spans multiple countries, Clémence shares insights into the struggles of women with breast cancer in treatment scarce environments, as well as tell us more about the international political dimensions of this and the legacies of French colonialism in cancer care.

This podcast is part of a series edited by Thandeka Cochrane, Fabien Provost, and Shagufta Bhangu, and produced by Rory O’Connor, https://linktr.ee/roryoconnor_music.