Former Prime Minister David Cameron has revealed he was being treated for prostate cancer.
Lord Cameron, 59, told the Times newspaper that his wife insisted he get tested after inspired by a BBC radio interview with entrepreneur Nick Joneswho advocated for more men to get tested after being diagnosed himself.
Lord Cameron had a prostate specific antigen (PSA) test earlier this year, followed by an MRI and a biopsy. The PSA test looks for proteins associated with prostate cancer and in Lord Cameron's case the result was high.
He was treated with focal therapy, which targets the area where the tumor is present, using techniques such as ultrasound waves to destroy cancer cells.
Prostate cancer is the most common cancer in men in the UK, with around 55,000 new cases diagnosed each year.
Lord Cameron told the newspaper he wanted to use his platform to support a call by the charity Prostate Cancer Research, which counts Mr Jones – the founder of the Soho House private club chain – as a trustee, for the screening to be offered to high-risk men.
Cancer most often occurs in old age – among men over 75 years of age. Cases under 50 years of age are rare. It is also more common in black men.
“I don’t particularly like discussing my personal intimate health issues, but I feel I have to,” Lord Cameron said.
“Let's be honest. Men are not very good at talking about their health. We tend to put things off.”
But he said, “I kind of thought, well, this happened to you and you should back it up with your voice.”
Lord Cameron, Conservative Prime Minister from 2010 to 2016 and then Foreign Secretary in Rishi Sunak's government, told the Times: “I would feel bad if I didn’t say that I had this experience. I had a scan. It helped me discover something was wrong. It gave me a chance to deal with it.”
There is currently no prostate cancer screening program in the UK due to concerns about the accuracy of PSA tests.
But the colleague's intervention came days after the country launched a major prostate cancer screening trial. The goal is to find the best way to detect the disease.
About every eighth man will develop prostate cancer in their lifetimeAccording to Prostate Cancer UK, research has shown that it has overtaken breast cancer as the most commonly diagnosed form of the disease in the UK.
