King Charles’ diagnosis forced the government to take notice of the huge hospital queues, AP News reports.
For Anna Gittins, three months would have spelled the difference between life and death after learning of her diagnosis in 2022. The primary school headmistress from Hereford in the west of England was shocked when she found out two years ago that she had advanced colorectal cancer. She immediately went to her local hospital, where she was told no one would be able to admit her for three months “due to high demand and low capacity of senior doctors”. She was just 46. Anna said, using another term for colorectal cancer:
“I’ve just been diagnosed with stage 4 bowel cancer, metastasised to my liver. I don’t have three months to wait.”
Gittins had access to private health care and has since undergone surgery and chemotherapy. She said:
“I consider myself so lucky, but there are so many people who will die needlessly when more prompt treatment would help them. And that’s not fair. Not in a country like ours.”
Gittins is one of thousands of people with cancer who have been let down by the UK’s National Health Service, a once revered institution that is now in acute crisis due to understaffing and years of underfunding.
Waiting times for cancer diagnosis and treatment across the UK have worsened in recent years to record highs, with experts saying too many cancers are being diagnosed too late. Experts also warn that the burden of cancer is set to rise as the country’s population ages.
The issue was brought into focus by a recent announcement by palace officials that King Charles III had been diagnosed with cancer. Officials did not say what form of cancer Charles has, saying only that it was discovered during a recent procedure to correct an enlarged prostate.
The 76-year-old monarch’s decision to speak openly about his diagnosis has attracted praise, with experts saying it is a powerful reminder that cancer affects one in two people in the UK. The news sparked a “King Charles effect” across the country with increased visits to cancer information and support websites.
However, many couldn’t help but compare the rapid treatment Charles received within days of his diagnosis to how ordinary Britons are treated in public hospitals.
Health officials are aiming for 75% of patients with suspected cancer to receive a diagnosis within four weeks of urgent contact with a doctor. They also claim that 85% of cancer patients should wait less than two months for their first treatment.
Experts say the last time all these waiting time figures were reached in England was in 2015, with delays even longer in poorer parts of the country such as Northern Ireland.
According to the Nuffield Trust, an independent think tank, one in three patients in the UK waits more than two months to start treatment after an urgent referral for a cancer screening. A total of 225,000 people have waited too long since 2020, Radiotherapy UK reports.
Survival rates for common cancers in the UK have consistently lagged behind countries with similar universal healthcare systems and per capita healthcare spending, according to a recent report by the charity Cancer Research UK.
As well as longer waits, cancer patients in the UK also receive less chemotherapy and radiotherapy than in countries such as Canada, Australia, Denmark and Norway, another study by the charity reports. Naser Turabi, director of evidence and implementation at Cancer Research UK, said:
“It’s quite worrying that we treat less in the U.K. than in comparable countries. For lung cancer, for example, 28% of patients get chemo in the UK In Norway it’s 45%.”
Turabi emphasised the lack of investment in equipment and specialists over the past 15 years, which has resulted in the UK ranking among the last 36 developed countries for the number of CT and MRI scanners. He said:
“We know we have an aging population, but there’s no specific commitment from the government to meet the demand that we know is coming. We cannot even provide online bookings for screening appointments. The digital infrastructure is 20 years out of date.”
Cancer survivor Kathy McAllister is so frustrated with the ineffectiveness of the NHS that she has retrained as a cancer advocate.
The former marketing director from Belfast, Northern Ireland, revealed that after being diagnosed with late-stage colorectal cancer in 2019, she waited at least two months to start treatment. She added that she was only able to get a repeat scan after treatment because she persevered with the hospital management. McAllister, 53, said:
“It’s just a wait at every stage. You expect cancer should be such a priority, that once you see a doctor they’re going to put arms around you, you’re going to be looked after, but you’re not. You’re just another number because they’re so overwhelmed.”
However, cancer care is not the only part of the NHS in crisis. Millions of people are struggling to get appointments with GPs or dentists, hospital emergency departments are regularly overcrowded and record numbers of people are sitting idle on waiting lists for routine treatment.
The COVID-19 pandemic has exacerbated the situation, but the NHS – a huge institution employing more than 1 million people – has long struggled as public funding has been cut and life expectancy has risen. Many blame the crisis on the austerity policies of successive Conservative governments, which have slashed health, social care and education budgets during their 14 years in power.
Asked about delays in cancer care, NHS England said cancer was being diagnosed early in more people than ever before and treatment options were becoming more numerous. Nearly 3 million people have had a potentially life-saving cancer diagnosis in the last year, up from 1.6 million a decade ago, the statement said.
Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, who has made reducing waiting times a top priority, blamed an unprecedented series of strikes by doctors and nurses for the lack of progress.
Tens of thousands of doctors have walked off the job repeatedly since late 2022, protesting against worsening working conditions and demanding pay rises that unions say have failed to keep pace with rising inflation. Last month junior doctors staged a six-day strike, the longest in NHS history.
McAllister, a cancer survivor, wants the issue of cancer treatment to be at the centre of attention ahead of the UK general election due this year. She is calling on the government to develop a cancer plan and give it the same attention and urgency as was given to the COVID-19 pandemic. She said:
“It’s just shocking every time cancer waiting times come out they get almost ignored. We’ve become a bit numb to those statistics. We need people to stand up and say, it isn’t good enough.”
