{"id":798536,"date":"2026-03-02T07:11:20","date_gmt":"2026-03-02T07:11:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/798536\/"},"modified":"2026-03-02T07:11:20","modified_gmt":"2026-03-02T07:11:20","slug":"lung-cancer-doubles-in-northern-irelands-rural-and-coastal-areas-as-population-ages-the-irish-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/798536\/","title":{"rendered":"Lung cancer doubles in Northern Ireland\u2019s rural and coastal areas as population ages \u2013 The Irish News"},"content":{"rendered":"

Lung cancer<\/a> cases have doubled in Northern Ireland\u2019s rural and coastal areas as the population ages<\/a>, an expert report<\/a> has warned.<\/p>\n

Dr Wendy Anderson spoke to the Irish News as a new report has set out recommendations to help overwhelmed services. <\/p>\n

Over 1,300 people are still diagnosed with the disease every year, with nearly half (44%) at a late stage when curative treatment is rarely possible.<\/p>\n

Despite a general drop in smoking and better treatments, Dr Anderson said those living in deprived areas were still twice as vulnerable and cases in rural and coastal areas have doubled in the last 20 years.<\/p>\n

\"Security<\/a>\"‘Heavenly<\/a><\/p>\n

She also warned young people about the long-term dangers of getting hooked on vapes at an early age.<\/p>\n

\"DrDr Wendy Anderson MBE, Respiratory Physician and Interim Chair of the Northern Ireland Lung Cancer Clinical Reference Group <\/p>\n

Another issue is the \u201cunacceptable delays\u201d facing lung cancer patients, with just 42.7% of patients seen within the 62-day national target. <\/p>\n

\u201cParts of Northern Ireland have doubled their over-75 population in the last 20 years and they\u2019ll double again,\u201d Dr Anderson said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s what\u2019s driving all the demands. That\u2019s why western society can\u2019t cope with healthcare demands.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe interesting thing about the demographics, is that ageing is rural and coastal.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo the biggest rise in lung cancers has been in the Northern Trust which has the oldest population, with the South Eastern Trust second.<\/p>\n

\u201cDeprivation is more in towns, which is why the baseline rise in Belfast and Derry is higher.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut the real rise in healthcare needs is rural and coastal, but we\u2019re still contracting and commissioning services without properly looking at the numbers.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are five times more care of the elderly doctors in Belfast than we have in Causeway.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe also really need the surgery issue sorted, there\u2019s no point in bringing people up for lung cancer treatment if we haven\u2019t got the surgeons to deliver.<\/p>\n

\u201cChris Whitty, the Chief Medical Officer for England, already called for more resources to be moved to rural and coastal areas in 2023.\u201d<\/p>\n

Thinking of her own retirement years, Dr Anderson said she had considered a move to the north coast.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe problem with that is there aren\u2019t enough young people to look after you,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo even if we have the money, we don\u2019t have the people. If you need a care package or a nursing home, we need to start to build appropriate accommodation.\u201d <\/p>\n

\"TheDr Anderson said highly addictive vapes being marketed towards children was a huge concern for the future (Alamy Stock Photo) <\/p>\n

On the effects of vaping, she noted they could vary from nicotine replacement to flavoured options containing different chemicals.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s evidence that they\u2019re highly addictive and people are deliberately marketing them to schoolchildren in the way cigarettes used to be,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI know of one school in Co Antrim where there\u2019s a vaping shop right across the street. The kids are coming in and they can\u2019t get through a lesson without having a vape.<\/p>\n

\u201cQuite often the tobacco companies are involved in this and they\u2019re clever, they know it will take us a while to catch up with the legislation.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese are very malign influences and we will undoubtedly have a consequence to that in the next 30 years, even if we don\u2019t yet know what that is.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"AA report from lung cancer experts in Northern Ireland has set out recommendations to help struggling services <\/p>\n

The report, \u2018Northern Ireland Blueprint for Lung Cancer,\u2019<\/a> calls for targeted lung cancer screening linked to smoking cessation \u2013 described as the most effective intervention to increase survival, especially in deprived communities.<\/p>\n

In England, this method has already detected 8,500 lung cancers with three-quarters at an early stage, while Northern Ireland has made \u201cno progress\u201d.<\/p>\n

Other demands are to cut red tape to allow Northern Ireland to participate in a National Lung Cancer Audit, improve radiology training and invest in artificial intelligence.<\/p>\n

The final recommendation is to expand surgical capacity and access to modern procedures like robotic surgery.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Lung cancer cases have doubled in Northern Ireland\u2019s rural and coastal areas as the population ages, an expert…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":798537,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5011],"tags":[78516,23523,2936,211,1144,22468,16,15,231745],"class_list":["post-798536","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-northern-ireland","tag-deprivation","tag-health-and-social-care","tag-lung-cancer","tag-nhs","tag-northern-ireland","tag-smoking","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-vapes"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/116158338824622823","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/798536","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=798536"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/798536\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/798537"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=798536"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=798536"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=798536"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}