By DIANE S. WILLIAMS

October is Cancer Awareness Month but during a global pandemic that halted most social activities, Yvonne Mosquito, an SSEU Local 371 member and Children’s Services Community Coordinator found a way to moved forward with friends and raise funds and awareness.

On Oct. 11 Mosquito rounded up nine coworkers and family to walk across the iconic Brooklyn Bridge and raise money for Making Strides breast cancer awareness.

While official events were canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic,  people are donating to the fight for a cure that funds research and provides services like meals and transportation for people undergoing breast cancer treatment.

“Breast cancer affects women and men,” Mosquito saId. After losing her grandmother Wilhelmina Pinder to breast cancer in 1996, Mosquito, a 21-year ACS worker, became a regular participant in the annual Making Strides fundraiser.

“The nine of us walked with last year’s banner across the bridge from Brooklyn’s Tillary Street to Chambers Street in Manhattan and back,” Mosquito said. “Several people joined us as we walked. We wore our masks– and our pink!”

Mosquito’s coworkers include friends Jacqueline Johnson, an ACS Family Court worker, and Local 1549 member Adria Bernardez.
Mosquito also held a bake sale outside her Bedford-Stuyvesant home. She said, “All together we raised about a thousand dollars.”

Mosquito said, “I am personally motivated, and I walk to honor my grandmother. The more I can do to help find a cure, the better I feel. I’m helping the next generation.”

“It’s heartwarming to see our members give of themselves in the midst of the pandemic,” said SSEU Local 371 President Anthony Wells. “They are committed to raising awareness and the struggle to find a cure for breast cancer.”