A reader writes on cancer screening and Jade Goody:
The problem with the ‘get everybody screened to save one life’ proposal is that in doing so you will do a great deal of damage, and quite possibly kill off more than the one life you hope to save. The continuing furore here over breast cancer screening is a case in point; doctors are writing furious letters to the Times for and against because the most recent research concludes that:
‘if 2,000 women are screened regularly for ten years, one will benefit as she will avoid dying from breast cancer. At the same time ten healthy women will be treated unnecessarily, having part or the whole of a breast removed and receiving radiotherapy and sometimes chemotherapy. A further 200 healthy women will have a false alarm.’
The NHS is in an embarassing position since its invitation for breast cancer screening makes no mention of any possible harms at all, and is thus clearly in breach of the obligation to ensure that each patient gives informed consent to any procedure.
An honest invitation would say that there is a very small chance that screening will save your life but a much bigger chance that you will be treated for cancer even though you don’t have cancer. It is perhaps unsurprising that people whose careers consist of running breast cancer screening programmes don’t wish to send out that kind of invitation…
There is a genuine reason for not routinely screening very young women for cervical cancer; there is a high incidence of abnormal cells in very young women which are not the precursors of cancer. But if those very young women without any symptoms are routinely screened then willy-nilly they are on to the treadmill of repeated testing, and possibly treatment which, in addition to being unpleasant in itself, will impair their chances of a successful pregnancy without reducing their chances of subsequently developing cervical cancer….
