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Former British Prime Minister David Cameron, who has revealed that he is undergoing treatment for prostate cancer, has called for a targeted screening program for the disease.
Prime Minister David Cameron, 59, revealed in an interview with British newspaper The Times on Sunday that his wife Samantha encouraged him to get tested for prostate cancer.
“You always hope for the best outcome,” Cameron says. He first went for a prostate-specific antigen (PSA) test, which assesses levels of a protein associated with prostate cancer.
Although his results were worryingly high, Prime Minister David Cameron said he remained optimistic. “You have a high PSA score, but it’s probably nothing,” he said.
“I had an MRI scan and there were some dark marks. I thought, ‘Oh, it’s probably going to be OK.’ But what if the biopsy results come back and say I have prostate cancer?” he added.
“It’s always scary to hear words like that, and when they come out of a doctor’s mouth you literally think, ‘Oh no, he’s going to say it. He’s going to say it. Oh, my God, he’s going to say it,'” said Prime Minister David Cameron, who is now a member of the British Parliament.
After undergoing focal therapy, which uses needles to send electrical pulses that destroy the cancer, Cameron decided to join the call for more screening.
Prostate cancer is the second most common cancer among men in the United States, after non-melanoma skin cancer.
According to the National Cancer Institute, about 11% of American men will be diagnosed with prostate cancer during their lifetime, and about 2.5% will die from prostate cancer.
Most prostate cancers grow very slowly, and it usually takes at least 10 years for cancer that has not spread beyond the prostate to cause serious symptoms.
A long-term British study published in 2023 found that most prostate cancers detected by blood tests that measure PSA levels have no negative impact on a man’s life and do not require treatment.
As a result, many experts question whether the costs of mass screening programs outweigh the benefits, due to the risks of misdiagnosis and unnecessary treatment.
However, Prime Minister Cameron agrees with the charity Prostate Cancer Research Group that programs targeting high-risk men that take advantage of medical advances, such as the focal therapy he received, would benefit public health.
“Things are changing,” he told the Times. “The debate is changing, so it’s a very good time to revisit this.”
Prime Minister David Cameron will now use his position in the House of Lords to push for change.
“I have a platform. This is something we have to seriously think about, talk about and act on if necessary,” he said.
