Research; BMJ 13 October 2008.
By: Joakim Dillner, professor, Lund University, Medical Microbiology, University Hospital MAS, 205 02 Malmö, Sweden et al.

This joint analysis of studies across western Europe concludes that, for women with negative cytology and negative HPV testing, such combined screening every six years would be safe.

By: Jeremy Laurance, Health Editor, The Independent
Friday, 3 October 2008

Energy saving light bulbs can emit levels of ultraviolet radiation sufficient to damage the skin, the Government’s public health safety watchdog warned.
‘Open’ bulbs can be harmful if used close to skin, but closed bulbs are safe.

By: Laura May, PA, The Independent
Tuesday, 30 September 2008

Black men in England are three times more likely than whites to get prostate cancer and tend to be diagnosed five years younger, researchers have found.

Researchers at the University of Bristol found no evidence that black men get poorer access to health care.

They said the differences between races could not be explained by differences in the tests, screening or information black or white men had about the condition.

Reporting in the the British Journal of Cancer, scientists said black men were more likely to be referred to hospital for further investigation by their GP.

Source: BMJ, 17 September 2008.

Before Robert Mayer, a GP and family therapist, died earlier this year of pancreatic cancer, he wrote about the cost of treating cancer on the NHS and why patients should be allowed to co-pay for expensive drugs. Read his personal view, as well as extracts from a diary he kept in the last few months of his life.

By: Geoffrey Lean, Environment Editor, The Independent
Sunday, 21 September 2008

Alarming new research from Sweden on the effects of radiation raises fears that today’s youngsters face an epidemic of the disease in later life.

Children and teenagers are five times more likely to get brain cancer if they use mobile phones, startling new research indicates.

The study, experts say, raises fears that today’s young people may suffer an “epidemic” of the disease in later life. At least nine out of 10 British 16-year-olds have their own handset, as do more than 40 per cent of primary schoolchildren.

By: Jeremy Laurance, Health Editor, The Independent
Saturday, 6 September 2008

A global shortage of radioactive imaging agents vital to the diagnosis of cancer and other diseases threatens to delay treatment for hundreds of patients in Britain.

Specialists warned yesterday that UK hospitals are receiving less than half the expected supplies of medical isotopes used in heart and bone scans and some cancer detection procedures, and the situation is expected to worsen over the coming weeks. The isotopes are used in more than 80 per cent of routine nuclear imaging tests used to diagnose disease.

By: Jeremy Laurance, Health Editor, The Independent
Thursday, 14 August 2008

Moisturisers used by millions every day may be increasing the risk of common skin cancers, scientists have warned.

Most such creams have never been tested for their cancer-causing effect on the skin. Now scientists have found that they increase the carcinogenic effect of sunlight in mice.

Experiments on mice had shown that when caffeine was given orally or applied direct to the skin, it appeared to inhibit cancer.

The significance of the findings for humans has still to be established, the team reports in the Journal of Investigative Dermatology.

Click on the picture to enlarge …

By: Jeremy Laurance, Health Editor, The Independent
Friday, 8 August 2008

“Why are we asking this now?

Cancer charities, kidney specialists and campaigners were outraged yesterday when the National Institute for Clinical Excellence (Nice), announced that it had rejected four new drugs for advanced kidney cancer as too expensive for the NHS.

In draft guidance, the medicines watchdog said that the drugs can extend life by five to six months on average but they cost too much. The money would do more good if it were spent elsewhere in the NHS, it said.

Surely the NHS should provide these drugs?

Of course they should.
So why wouldn’t Nice give the go-ahead?
Because, it said, the drugs were not “cost-effective”.

What do the drugs cost?

Between £20,000 and £35,000 per patient per year. But that is only half the story. We also need to know how much benefit they bring.

Why are the drugs so expensive?

This is the question that dare not speak its name. It is incomprehensible that the manufacturers of the four drugs have so far escaped criticism. They are charging astronomical prices for drugs that offer little benefit – in effect, holding a gun to the heads of kidney cancer sufferers and saying to the NHS: “Give us the money or we shoot.”

So did Nice do the wrong thing?

Yes…:

* Patients in need of these drugs have few other options available to them

* Expensive or not, other European countries find the funds to provide the drugs

* It is inhumane to deny anyone the chance of living longer, even if the drug is not a cure

No…:

* They are too expensive for the benefit they deliver, which is not ultimately life-saving

* This is a zero-sum game: a pound spent on one patient is a pound denied to another

* It is unrealistic to expect every drug to be approved: the NHS budget is not unlimited

By Jeremy Laurance, Health Editor, The Independent
Tuesday, 10 June 2008

Affluent families who take their children on foreign holidays where they are exposed to intense sunlight are contributing to soaring rates of malignant melanoma among the young.

The severest form of skin cancer, which causes 1,800 deaths a year, is rising fastest in people in their teens and twenties and is most common among the better-off, doctors said.

Severe sunburn in childhood is a key trigger for the cancer and the growth of foreign holidays, in winter and summer, is increasing the incidence of sun exposure in children.

Professor Birch said: “The simple conclusion is that it is down to excess sun exposure in childhood. But in these very young people there is likely to be something else going on. We are probably looking at a combination of sun exposure and genetic susceptibility.

“It is not just Mediterranean holidays but skiing holidays, sunbeds and other elements of the affluent lifestyle. The message is sun protection. Use a sunscreen but, even more important, cover up and keep out of the midday sun.”

By: Jeremy Laurance, Health Editor, The Independent
Thursday, 26 June 2008

The chances of getting breast cancer vary more than sixfold among women because of their genetic inheritance but the breast screening programme fails to target those at highest risk, scientists have found.