The Canadian model and actress, who was in Mumbai to inaugurate a cancer institute, speaks about her 'rebirth' following her fight against the disease.
On June 23 last year, Lisa Ray revealed publicly that she had cancer. The Toronto-based actress wrote that she was suffering from multiple myeloma, a relatively rare type of blood cancer.
Multiple myeloma, known to have affected barely 6,000 Canadians so far, is known to be a disease of the elderly, affecting people in their 60s.
Ray, 36, is perhaps one of the few exceptions.
Dr Boman Dhabhar, a prominent oncologist in Mumbai, tells you that the disease affects the kidneys and bones and its treatment is very aggressive. "It involves a cocktail of targeted drugs that bring the disease under control following a stem cell transplant. Most of the time multiple myeloma is incurable and even after a transplant, the disease tends to comes back," he says.
Lisa Ray has called it a cancer that isn't as 'sexy' as the others and has been speaking about it on all available platforms. Last week in Mumbai, she became the face of Fortis Hosiptals' newly-launched cancer institute.
Looking stunning in an off-shoulder grey dress, Ray may have seemed a tad out of place among the formally dressed and serious-looking doctors and corporate honchos. But the confident actress walked past a frenzy of flashlights and camerapersons to the dais and addressed the media: "I am Lisa Ray," she said, "And I am a cancer survivor."
Image: Lisa Ray at the launch of a Fortis Cancer Institute in Mulund, Mumbai
Photographs: Hitesh Harisinghani
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