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NICE has said no to Abiraterone. Don't rail at NICE. At least, not only at them. They follow rules and they restrict their remit.

There are several assumptions in that header. The least problematic being is there a need to increase cancer research in rare cancers?  As people are dying that’s certainly a ‘yes’ in all cancers and particularly in the subset of ‘rare’.

My wobbly human rights slant pops up at the end, rather than being the centre of the story.

Aha! Another mildly daft poll, about the daft British public, women in this case, and their erroneous beliefs on cancer risk, in women. This one is a bread and butter error, arising from the cumulative effect of all dopey, disconnected cancer awareness everywhere. Once more, gender specific cancers are thought of as being a greater problem for a gender (in this case women) than non-gender specific cancers are.

Today is not the day to be working for a breast cancer charity. Staff will be drafting Press Releases and copy for the websites, the phones will be ringing off the hook, some callers will be distressed, others angry, the press will be pressing and at the back of the staff’s mind will be the uncertainty.

This month is Breast Cancer Awareness Month. (BCAM) Deep sigh. This is the annual high point of my cancer awareness scepticism, stimulated by breast cancer charities and their crappy business model that muddles awareness for health, with their brand recognition and market share. See legions of my previous posts….

The Care Quality Commission has, once again, exposed the low standards of care inflicted on far too many elderly adults in the National Health Service. 20% of sites visited were failing to ensure dignity or nutrition for their patients, or both. One in five.

British breast cancer charities are all, as far as I can tell, in favour of breast screening. This will be for two reasons. One is that they are genuinely totally convinced of the value of it and that the benefits for all woman far outweigh any risks. The second reason is more intangible – screening’s usefulness as a ‘Call to Action’ and its symbolic strength as a sign of engagement with breast cancer awareness.

Yesterday (Thursday 1 September) I read this piece on the Channel 4 news website. It's about a paper in the Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine which apparently says says the risks of breast cancer over diagnosis are ‘not made clear’. Ears pricked up.

Today is the start of Blue September in the UK. It's a vital initiative that might shift the public discourse on cancer onto a different, more productive track. 

Or not. But I can dream.