£9m boost for new campaigns to spot cancers early

Bowel, breast and lung cancer affect more than 120,000 people each year in the UK but chances of survival increase if the disease is caught early.

Estimates have shown that 10,000 lives could be saved in England each year if survival rates matched the best in Europe. Health Minister Paul Burstow said the 9m would be available from January for local campaigns aimed at encouraging people to visit their doctor with concerns.

A total of 59 campaigns will focus on breast, bowel or lung cancer, or any combination of the three, depending on the target audience in each region.

Two pilot studies will be set up for bowel cancer to see if a national awareness campaign would be effective.

Local areas will use social marketing to get the message across, including social networking sites such as Twitter and Facebook.

One example of a successful campaign comes from Doncaster and involved a bus stop that made a coughing noise.

It led to an increase in the number of people who visited their GP for a lung cancer test.

The number of cases diagnosed in one month also rose by almost 60 per cent (from 32 to 54) compared with the same month in the previous year.

Other data on cancers reveal importance of early diagnosis, with more than 90 per cent of people with bowel cancer living at least five years if they are diagnosed in the early stage compared with 6.6 per cent in the late stage.

Around one in 20 people will get bowel cancer at some point in their life, with more than 38,000 new cases in the UK in 2007 and more than 16,000 deaths. Around half of people currently survive for five years and about 44 per cent live at least 10 years after diagnosis.

Mr Burstow said the Government's aim was to save lives and achieve cancer survival rates among the best in the world.

"In England we are lagging behind European countries when it comes to the common but big killer cancers such as breast, bowel and lung.

"The NHS is spending at European levels but still not delivering European cancer survival rates."

Deborah Alsina, of Bowel Cancer UK, and Mark Flannagan, chief executive of Beating Bowel Cancer, issued a joint statement saying: "By increasing awareness of the disease and encouraging people to act on their symptoms, these regional and national campaigns have the potential to save thousands of lives."