January 2007 Podcast Transcript

The January podcast features the latest cancer news. We pop down the pub to find out what’s really in cigarette smoke, discover a potential new treatment for pancreatic cancer, and ask if computers will ever replace doctors.

Kat: Coming up later, we reveal the shocking news that you can find the cancer-causing chemicals arsenic, benzene and formaldehyde on the high street. And I’ll be discovering how the prospects may be changing for pancreatic cancer in the future. First, it’s time for a roundup of the latest news stories from Henry Scowcroft.

Henry: Hitting the headlines this month was a warning from Cancer Research UK that increasing rates of obesity could cause as many as 12,000 new cases of cancer per year by 2010. Excess weight can increase the risk of several cancers, including cancer of the bowel, the womb, the kidneys, and breast cancer in postmenopausal women. Being overweight or obese is thought to cause 4% of all cancers in the UK each year. After smoking, it’s thought to be the most important preventable cause of cancer.

A recent Cancer Research UK survey revealed that although people knew that being overweight or obese can lead to heart disease, very few people were aware of the link with cancer risk. Cancer Research UK’s Reduce the Risk campaign is designed to highlight the steps that everyone can take to cut their risk of cancer. These include eating a healthy diet, maintaining a suitable bodyweight and staying active. You can find out more from the Reduce the Risk website.

In other news, the results of a study into the best age at which to screen women for breast cancer, which Cancer Research UK helped to fund, showed that there was no significant benefit in screening women under the age of 50. Currently, the NHS Breast Screening programme invites women between the ages of 50 and 70 to attend screening. The new study, which followed 160,000 women, showed that there was no clear benefit for women in their 40s to be included in the programme.

Two-thirds of breast cancers occur in women over 65. Screening between the ages of 50 - 70 saves the lives of 1,400 lives every year in England, and some have questioned whether this should be extended to younger women. But the researchers found that screening from the age 40 would only pick up a few cases of cancer and pre-cancerous problems. And when this was considered against the possible disadvantages, such as exposure to radiation, the increased anxiety caused by the occasional false-positive result, and increased cost, this was not enough to make it worth lowering the age of screening. The study was led by Dr Sue Moss, from the Institute of Cancer Research in Surrey, who spoke to us on the phone.

Comment - Dr Sue Moss

"We need to look at longer follow-up from this trial to get a clearer picture of what the effect of screening is. Clearly there are some costs and disadvantages associated with screening as well, that women need to be aware of. But in the meantime all women should continue to be breast aware, and clearly if they’re aware of any changes they should go to their GP."

Henry: And finally this month, Cancer Research UK welcomed the results of a major Danish study that found there was no link between mobile phone use and cancer rates. The research, by the Institute of Cancer Epidemiology in Copenhagen, studied the rates of cancer in over 400,000 people who subscribed to mobile phone services between 1982 and 1995, and whose health was tracked for an average of 8 years. The researchers did not find any link between mobile phone use and rates of brain cancer, eye cancer, tumours of the salivary glands or leukaemia.

Although this is good news and reassuring for mobile users, it doesn’t quite settle the issue, as we still have no answers about very long term effects of mobile phone use. To answer this, the International Agency for Research on Cancer is currently coordinating a large study across 13 different countries, including the UK, to determine the long-term effects of mobile phone use. When they’re finally published, the results should settle the debate.

Kat: And if you want to find out more about mobile phones, healthy living, or any of our news stories then simply visit our News & Resources website.

2007 sees the introduction of smoke-free legislation in England, Wales and Northern Ireland, preventing smoking in enclosed workplaces including pubs and clubs. Scotland went smoke-free in March 2006, and it has generally been a success. If you’re a smoker, and want to quit ahead of the ban, then here’s some information to help you make your mind up. At the beginning of December, Cancer Research UK launched a new anti-smoking campaign, funded by the Department of Health. A series of hard-hitting radio and TV ads have been produced by documentary maker Donal McIntyre, aimed at raising awareness of the toxic chemicals found in tobacco smoke. Around 4,000 chemicals are found in smoke, and many of them can cause cancer. I went to the pub to find out more.

Feature: Smoke is Poison

Health Information Officer Ed Yong and Tobacco Control Manager Elspeth Lee talk about the Smoke is Poison campaign and the benefits of the smoke-free legislation. A smoker, Max, talks about his experiences and how he hopes to give up.

Kat: And you can find out more about the chemicals in tobacco smoke by texting the word Poison to 84118, or visit the Smoke is Poison website.

Every year, nearly 7,000 people are diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in the UK, and survival rates are very low. Professor Nick Lemoine is from the Cancer Research UK Clinical Research Centre at Barts and the London, and he’s developing an entirely new type of treatment for pancreatic cancer, based on a rather clever virus. I caught up with Nick to find out more.

Interview: Professor Nick Lemoine

Professor Lemoine talks about the current outlook for pancreatic cancer. Thanks to the new discoveries about the genes involved in the disease, he and his team have developed a genetically-engineered virus that can target and destroy pancreatic cancer cells. The virus leaves healthy cells unaffected, so the treatment should have fewer side effects than conventional treatments. He hopes to test it in clinical trials with pancreatic patients soon.

Computers seem to rule our lives nowadays, and they’ve brought innumerable benefits in many areas of science and medicine. But could they ever replace doctors? Professor John Fox heads up the Cancer Research UK Advanced Computation Laboratory, and he’s developing computer programmes that can help doctors to make the best decisions about an individual cancer patient’s treatment. But will the doctors of the future be robots? I asked John to explain more.

Interview: Professor John Fox

Professor Fox talks about the Credo project, a computer programme designed to help doctors make reliable, evidence-based decisions about breast cancer treatment. The team have produced a short film about Credo.

The research progress that’s being made by Professor Lemoine and Professor Fox wouldn’t be possible without the help of Cancer Research UK’s supporters. If you’d like to support the work of Cancer Research UK, either by donating directly or by getting involved in a fundraising event, then go and have a look at our Support Us website.

Finally, in the last show we brought you the news that Cancer Research UK’s new Cancer 2020 petition managed to gain more than quarter of a million signatures before it was handed in to 10 Downing Street at the end of November. The campaign was asking the government to plan for the future of cancer services in the UK. Now Health Secretary Patricia Hewitt has announced that the government has agreed to draw up a new strategy. I spoke to Jon Spiers from Cancer Research UK’s campaign team to find out what this means.

Interview: Jon Spiers, Cancer Campaigns

On the 30th November, Patricia Hewitt announced a cancer reform strategy for the NHS which will re-examine cancer services in the light of the issues that we highlighted in our Cancer 2020 campaign - namely the demographic changes, the rapid advances in technology and the changes in the cancer policy environment. We’re looking forward to future successes in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland as well. We’re handing those petitions over in February, and we hope to get a similar response. People can find out more from the Cancer Campaigns website.

Kat: We’ve reached the end of the show so we hope you’ve enjoyed the podcast. We’ll be back next month telling you how to enter 2007’s Race for Life series (girls only, I’m afraid), and bringing you all the latest news in cancer and research. We want to know what you think of the show, so please leave your feedback about the podcast by filling in the  survey on our webpage. And don’t forget that you can sign up to our RSS feed to get the latest Cancer Research UK podcast delivered straight to your computer every month. And if you’d like to get involved in our podcast, or simply let us know what you think, then email us at podcast@cancer.org.uk

That’s all for now, goodbye!

• Credits:
• Presented and produced by Kat Arney
• News by Henry Scowcroft and Josephine Querido
• Original music written and performed by Kat Arney and Henry Scowcroft
• With special thanks to Bojan Vukasinovic, Nicola O’Connor, Jack Wallington, Simon Duck, and all the participants