Casualty star raises cancer awareness

More than 130 women are dying from cervical cancer every year in London, despite the fact that the disease can be easily prevented with early screening.

Jan Anderson, who played nurse Chloe in BBC1's Casualty, is today launching a London-wide awareness day to encourage women who have never been screened for cervical cancer to go for the five-minute test.

The actress, who is now joining the cast of London's Burning, will be promoting a card that carries details about where to go for a smear test, with space to record the telephone number of the patient's preferred practitioner.

Women will be able to pick up the card from GP surgeries, family-planning and well-woman clinics, as well as genito-urinary clinics in hospitals in the next few weeks.

Latest figures show that 135 women died from cervical cancer in the capital in 2000, while an estimated 80,000 London women have never been screened for the disease. Half of these are aged between 40 and 64, the highest-risk age group.

However, it is not just older women who are at risk. Of the 309 women diagnosed with cervical cancer in 1999, 25 per cent were in their twenties and thirties.

Dr Kathie Binysh, director of the London Cervical Screening Quality Assurance Reference Centre, said: "If you go to your GP it will usually be the practice nurse who performs the test. You can always ask for a woman to take your smear.

"Alternatively, you can go to a well-woman clinic, family-planning clinic or genito-urinary clinic at a hospital. As for being embarrassed, doctors and nurses won't be; they are examining women all the time. It's five minutes of discomfort which could save your life."

The campaign also hopes to encourage more women from ethnic minorities to be screened. In some cultures smear tests are seen as intrusion, and some women are not accustomed to that type of examination.

Unlike many other cancers, cervical cancer can be detected and stopped before it has developed into pre-cancerous cells. Treatment is virtually 100 per cent effective.

Dr Binysh said: "Many younger women believe it is something that only affects older women and it is true that it is more prevalent in later life. But it's something all women need to be screened for throughout their lives."