CERVICAL SCREENING PROGRAMME - WHAT IT IS AND WHO IS ELIGIBLE?
Screening: The test is currently offered to women aged 25 or over
The NHS offers a free cervical screening test to all women aged 25-64 every three to five years.
It is not a test for cervical cancer, but it identifies early abnormalities which, if left untreated, could develop into cancer of the cervix (neck of the womb).
A sample of cells is taken from the cervix for analysis and sent to a laboratory for analysis. Those whose cells show abnormalities are called back for further investigation and, if necessary, treatment.
Currently the test is not offered routinely to women aged younger than 25 because cervical cancer is so rare in women that young. According to Cancer Research UK statistics, not a single woman under the age of 20 died from cervical cancer between 2009-2011.
The lower age of 25 was raised from 20 after the Advisory Committee on Cervical Cancer Screening (ACCS) advised the NHS in 2003 that cervical screening in younger women did more harm than good.
The committee advised that cell abnormalities in younger women normally went away of their own accord, and said that sending young women for further tests and treatment increased the likelihood of the woman having pre-term delivery if she went on to have children, and could cause significant anxiety.
Many other countries offer cervical screening from the age of 25, including Italy, France, Belgium and Ireland. In Scotland, women are invited to be checked from the age of 20, though it is due to go up to 25 next year. In Australia women are invited from 18, Greece from 20, and in the US two years after women become sexually active.
Meanwhile, other countries start cervical screening later. Both the Netherlands and Finland offer screening to women only once they are 30, and these two countries boast some of the lowest mortality rates for cervical cancer in Europe, and in Bulgaria it is for women over 31.
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