Report demands overhaul of cancer care in England

Cancer care across England is poorly coordinated, funding varies widely from one area to another and doctors are not referring patients for treatment quickly enough, a parliamentary report said Wednesday.

The government has put Primary Care Trusts in charge of spending most of England's cancer budget but many of the local health bodies lack the experience and expertise to allocate those funds, the All Party Parliamentary Group on Cancer said.

"The inquiry has exposed a serious problem. The government rightly says that cancer care is a national priority yet the system that's expected to deliver it is too fragmented," said the group's chair, Ian Gibson.

The report recommended that the budget for cancer treatment and prevention should go directly to cancer networks - the groups of hospitals through which care is organized - so they can make long-term plans on how best to fight the disease.

It also said family doctors should have special training to recognize cancer symptoms sooner.

Charity CancerBACUP, which co-authored the report, says one in three people develop cancer during their lifetime and the government has pledged to improve cancer prevention.

Health Secretary John Reid said the government did want better training for doctors but he was not convinced the current system of funding from local boards was inadequate.

"The proof of the pudding is in the eating in this because we have now got almost 1,200 more consultants, we have got hundreds, thousands of pieces of modern equipment," he told the BBC, adding cancer deaths had fallen by 12.2 percent since 1997.

The report came as the government announced a new national screening program for bowel cancer, the second biggest cancer killer in England.

Reid said the government would invest 37.5 million pounds over two years to fund a program starting in April 2006.