CANCER TEST AT AGE 50 FOR ALL
SCREENING for bowel cancer is to start 10 years earlier, at the age of 50.
Home testing kits will be issued in England and Wales every two years, up to age 74.
Independent experts had recommended screening should be extended after a review – and yesterday ministers agreed.
BBC news reader George Alagiah, 62, said his bowel cancer could have been caught earlier if screening from age 50 was in place when he was diagnosed at stage four in 2014.
The change will bring England and Wales into line with Scotland.
Chances of survival for at least five years with stage four bowel cancer are less than 10%, but if caught at stage one, it is nearly 100%.
The disease is Britain’s second-biggest cancer killer and 42,000 people are diagnosed with it each year.
Prof Anne Mackie, of Public Health England, said: “The risk of bowel cancer rises steeply from around age 50 to 54. Starting screening 10 years earlier at 50 will help spot abnormalities earlier.” Currently people are invited for screening at age 60 and sent a home-testing kit. This will now be upgraded to a more accurate faecal immunochemical kit.
FIT will now be offered to all 60 to 74 year olds and it will be gradually phased in to over55s and then over-50s.
Deborah Alsina, of Bowel Cancer UK, said a timeframe was now “urgently needed”.
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