The Government will provide funding for a £120 blood test which has the potential to detect the 12 most common forms of cancer before symptoms develop.
The Mionco screening can identify 50 cancers before producing a false positive and is a form of the PCR test used during the Covid pandemic, according to the scientists involved in its development.
It checks the 12 most common forms of the disease: lung, breast, prostate, pancreas, colorectal, ovary, liver, brain, esophagus, bladder, bone and soft tissue sarcoma, and stomach.
The government will provide £2.5m via the National Institute for Health and Care Research to improve the speed of the test, the Sunday Mirror reported.
The Health Secretary, West Streetinga cancer survivor, told the newspaper it could be a “game changer” in revolutionizing treatment of the disease five years from now.
Streeting said: “Just a few drops of blood can tell you if you have lung, breast or bladder cancer, helping end months of waiting for tests and scans.
“These innovations can be game changers and life savers. But Tory underinvestment has left the NHS 15 years behind the private sector when it comes to technology. We have fewer scanners per patient than Greece.
“Your life chances depend on your postcode and whether you can afford to go private. I am determined to equip the NHS with the latest technology so that it benefits the many, not just the few.”
Scientists at Southampton University reportedly used clinical information from 20,000 cancer patients to develop the screening.
The next phase involves improving the efficiency of the artificial intelligence involved, which analyzes the test samples and biomarkers by entering 8,000 blood samples from people of diverse ethnic backgrounds.
Prof Paul Skipp from Southampton University said: “A test like this could save many lives and catch cancers much earlier. We hope to have an NHS trial in five to seven years.”
Currently, breast, bowel, cervical and lung cancer have NHS screening tests, but these involve a scan or a biopsy.
Skipp added: “The UK spends £800m a year on screening for these four cancers, and an additional £91m is spent on false positive follow-ups.”
last month, a £42 million screening trial which aims to revolutionize the treatment of prostate cancer has started in the UK.
Thousands of men will be involved in the initial phase, and several hundred thousand volunteers could be recruited as the program progresses in the coming years, the trial’s organizers say.
