More than 60,000 patients with cancer per year do not receive radiation therapy at all, while some patients in England According to the study, people are waiting for up to six months to start treatment.
The situation is so terrible that almost 100 heads of radiation therapy and oncology-three quarter of the leaders of radiation therapy of England, in an open letter, warned that the government was failing of patients.
International experts agree that More than half (53%) all patients with cancer, as a rule, need radiation therapy, but in England it actually receives it only 35%. According to the exclusive analysis of the latest NHS data with charitable radiation therapy of Great Britain, this means that 181,023 patients were supposed to receive radiation therapy, but only 120,569, leaving 60.455 In patients with cancer per year in England, which do not receive treatment of radiation therapy at all.
Regional inequality is common. While 36% of patients in the southwest receive radiation therapy, only 33.7% are done in the southeast, and more than 10,000 patients pass vital treatment.
Professor Price said that the leading oncologist and chairman of radio therapy, UK said that “thousands of patients with cancer risk dying prematurely either because they do not receive radiation therapy at all or from huge delays in the initial radiation treatment.”
“Radio therapy is one of the most economically effective and cancer treatment,” she said. “This is not“ nice to have ”, this is a saving treatment. The government should urgently invest in more cars, more staff and expand access to this vital treatment. Otherwise, Great Britain will remain stuck in the lower part of the cancer league tables, and patients will die crazy. ”
The data obtained follow the study of 780,000 people in 2024, comparing treatment in eight different types of cancer in every British country, Norway, Australia and Canada. A International partnership compared to cancer They found that people in the UK received less often with radiation therapy and encountered much longer than the expectation of treatment.
The latest NHS England data show that in July 2025, 61% of patients have been waiting for longer than two months To begin treatment, including radiation therapy, and only 39% of patients in England began radiation therapy within 62 days after the direction, against the national goal of 85%.
Some patients had to wait months to start radiation therapy. Alison was 64 years old, when she was diagnosed with breast cancer of the 1st stage. Faced with a 15-week expectation of an operation in her hospital in the South Coast, Alison decided to blow up his savings and go in a private order. When she found out that she would have to wait up to six months for radiation therapy, Alison decided to see if she could see her faster, since she could not afford more private treatment. Her consultant sent her to the Christie oncological center in Manchester, where she received radiation therapy at the end of June.
Although Alison cannot praise Christie enough for the care that she received, the need to drive more than 200 miles for her treatment was an injured experience.
“You know, I have experienced a lot in my life, but the mental flour through which I was experienced cannot be overestimated,” she said. “Indeed, this is terrible.
“I spent a week in Manchester, going to radiation therapy every day. I had to call a small bell at the end of my treatment on my own, 200 miles from my family. This is wrong. “
Lack of staff in addition to increasing demand is delay. According to the Royal College of Radiologists, in 2024 seven of 10 leaders of the cancer center said that the lack of personnel has endangered the safety of patientsThe experts report that radio therapy machines are idle In a number of trusts, or not able to work on weekends, because there are no staff to manage them. One head of radiation therapy from great confidence in the east of England stated that the “destructive reality” is that labor is explosive.
“After 35 years in the profession of radiation therapy, I can confidently say that the situation we are faced today is the worst that I saw when I saw. Throughout the country, machines for the treatment of radiation therapy are idle. Not only because of the technical shortcomings, but also because the staff is simply not enough to manage them, ”they said.
After increasing the newsletter
The crisis is so acute that 91 leaders of radiation therapy working in the centers of England wrote to the Minister of Health, UES is strokeCalling the governments to put priorities in investment in radiation therapy or risk the upcoming plan of cancer.
“Radio therapy was restrained by historical investment and systemic underpayment,” the letter says. “As a result, radiation therapy is often left outside the basic political conversations and suffers from outdated equipment, slow implementation of technology, chronic lack of labor and a sharp regional inequality.
“If we cannot finance and deliver radiation therapy, [the promise of the government’s cancer plan] It will be broken before it begins. ”
Mark Lawler, Professor of Digital Health at the University of Royal University at Belfast and chairman of International Cancer Benchmarking partnership said: “We are a global lag for both access and the terms of radiation therapy, for such as Denmark, France and for lung cancer, even Labrador and Newfoundland. I never thought I could hear me saying that. ”
Dr. Stephen Harden, President of the Royal College of X -ray, said that most patients faced “painful delays in radiation therapy.”
“Against the background of the soaring demand for cancer treatment, the lack of staff and delay with patients will deteriorate only if nothing is done to increase labor. While the government invested in the new Linac radio therapy, the lack of staff in some cancer centers means that they cannot offer treatment in the evenings and the weekend. ”
Department Health And social assistance turned to a comment.
