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Racial disparity in cancer diagnoses via screening in England


Black people are more than a third less likely than white people to be diagnosed with cancer via screening in England, according to the first study of its kind, prompting calls for targeted efforts to improve their levels of uptake.

Screening programmes save lives by preventing cancer from occurring or spotting it earlier, when treatment is more likely to be effective.

In England, screening for cervical cancer is offered to women aged 25 to 64, breast cancer screening is offered to women aged 50 to 70, and everyone aged 60 to 74 is offered a bowel cancer screening home test kit every two years.

The latest research, however, lays bare stark disparities in screening diagnosis rates between different ethnic groups for the first time. The study of more than 240,000 cancer patients over a decade found that 8.61% of patients were diagnosed via screening.

Broken down by ethnicity, the figure for white people was 8.27%, almost exactly the same as the national average, but among black people it was 5.11%. The findings suggests that black people are 38% less likely to be diagnosed via screening than white people.

Diagnosis via screening in mixed-race patients was much higher at 9.49%, and higher still in Asian patients at 10.09%, almost double the rate for black patients. The results were published in the British Journal of Cancer.

Jabeer Butt, the chief executive of the Race Equality Foundation, said the findings should prompt urgent action.

“Cancer screening saves lives,” he said. “That’s why it is so important that effective outreach and culturally appropriate interventions are prioritised to reduce health inequalities.

“We know that awareness of cancer symptoms is lower among minority ethnic groups, particularly black Africans, with higher reported barriers to seeking help. But we also know from previous research on colorectal cancer interventions that speaking to someone who explains the steps of the screening process ahead of time can lead to improvements in screening uptake in minority patients."

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Source: The Guardian, 6 June 2022

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