Blood test for cancer is NHS game changer

It checks for dozen big killers

- MARTIN BAGOT

A BLOOD test that can detect the 12 most common and lethal cancers before symptoms develop is to be funded by the government.

Health Secretary Wes Streeting - a cancer survivor - today reveals that the so-called universal blood screening could be a game changer for treatment of the disease in five years.

It's a form of the PCR test perfected in the pandemic, and scientists say it opens the door to NHS population cancer screening that could transform survival chances and save tens of thousands of lives a year.

Southampton University scientists have used clinical information from 20,000 cancer patients to develop the miONCO test they say is 99% accurate - beating similar tests.

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