Kim Simplis Barrow, President of Belize Cancer Society
by Charles Gladden
BELIZE CITY, Fri. July 18, 2025
The Belize Cancer Society hosted its second annual Men’s Health Forum on Thursday, July 17, at the Old Belize Pavilion.
The event is catered to men only, as it is used as a safe place for them to ask questions about concerns they may have or symptoms they might be experiencing, with experts readily available to answer them in the area of male-related illness.
Over 200 men from various walks of life attended the event.
“It’s a space for men to talk about the different issues, specifically men’s health issues that they are facing. They have experts and panelists who will be able to guide them, and they will be able to ask questions. It’s a safe space for them to do so,” said Kim Simplis-Barrow, president of the Belize Cancer Society.
“We’re trying to get them to be comfortable in seeking medical help, and we’re trying to empower them to know that it is not something to be scared of; it is not something that will make them weak; it is that they need to know how it shows us strength when they access health and mental health care,” she added.
According to Simplis-Barrow, the organization is noticing cases of men being diagnosed with cancer in its later stages, when the disease is harder to treat.
“When we are diagnosed at an earlier stage, we have the best chance of recovery. When you’re diagnosed at a later stage, it complicates matters. It magnifies the situation, so we must remove that barrier. We say, get attention as quickly as possible, because the quicker you’re diagnosed with whatever is ailing you, the better it will be if you’re diagnosed at the earlier stage,” she mentioned.
Dr. Jorge Hidalgo, a cancer survivor, who addressed the concerns of the men in attendance and provided answers to their questions, made a very similar point. “We try to delay things and say, I am going to do this, probably next year, or when I’m fifty, and we get afraid. When we reach thirty, we say, I am getting old. When we reach forty, we say, I am getting older; and when we reach fifty, we get afraid. I reached fifty, and at that point, no problems; but just immediately after that, I faced the diagnosis,” he said.
Dr. Hidalgo is an internist and a critical care specialist at Belize Healthcare Partners, where it’s natural for men to feel afraid and have a level of uncertainty when getting their diagnosis.
“The fear and uncertainty of the diagnosis of cancer brings to the patients, and brings to us … it’s definitely to create this space, but in our particular group of men, since we are essentially most of the time the ones who care about the family, care about the different situations around us. Then that puts an additional stress now – how we’re going to deal with bills; how we’re going to deal with those things; and what is going to happen with my family? It’s natural to have those fears and uncertainty, but the most important thing is that we need to have resilience and face the situation as it is,” he said.
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