Cervical screening reminder

Date published: 25 January 2012

Women across the borough are being urged to ensure they take part in regular cervical screening.

The call comes as part of Cervical Cancer Prevention week which runs from 22nd to the 28th January 2012.

The aim of the week is to remind people that cervical cancer can kill – but regular screening helps save thousands of lives every year.

Women in England and Wales aged between 25 and 64 years-old are invited to cervical screening, also known as a smear test, every three to five years.

Cervical screening is not a test for cancer. Screening prevents cancer by detecting early abnormalities in the cervix, so they can be treated. If these abnormalities are left untreated they can lead to cancer of the cervix. It's thought on average that cervical screening helps save the lives of 4,500 women in England every year.

Approximately 3,000 women a year are diagnosed with cervical cancer in the UK, and around 900 of these will die every year. It is the second most common cancer in women aged 35 and under, after breast cancer.

Despite this, more than 20 per cent of women invited for screening do not attend.

The Department of Health is supporting Cervical Cancer Prevention Week, a Europe wide initiative. The Department is focussing on two specific aspects of cervical cancer prevention – immunisation and screening.

Minister for Health, David Anderson MHK said: “To be able to vaccinate against this type of cancer is a remarkable step forward. By providing a HPV Immunisation Programme annually, the Department is taking action to save the lives of numerous women.

“We’re fortunate that we have these golden opportunities to prevent this potentially life threatening disease through immunisation as well as to detect and treat it early through screening. For this to work, we need all girls in the appropriate age bracket to take up the HPV vaccine and for all women to attend their regular screening appointments. Just having a simple set of injections or attending a screening test can save lives.”

Research shows that both awareness of cervical cancer and uptake of screening are considerably lower in women from minority ethnic communities in comparison to the wider population.