Lift the lid - have that conversation to beat bowel cancer

This month we start our campaign to get people to Lift the Lid and talk about what must be one of our last taboos - bowel cancer.  We want everyone to join in and talk about bowels, bottoms and bowel cancer - and to raise awareness, improve screening uptake and, ultimately, help save lives.  Because we just don't talk enough about this cancer.

Everywhere I go people ask me about my bum shorts badge on my lapel and I always ask them to identify what it is all about.  "Prostate cancer?" is a common guess.  Never has anyone said bowel cancer.  So, that gives me the chance to start a conversation.  I usually ask people to guess just how big an issue bowel cancer is - and no-one ever gets it right by correctly saying it is a big cancer killer (second biggest) and a very common cancer (fourth).  I also surprise people - shock them even - by pointing out that bowel cancer is effectively 93% "curable" (five year survival in official terms).  From family members to shopkeepers to high profile people in the media to senior politicians every one of them has been really surprised that bowel cancer can have such a huge survival rate.  Every one of them has got the fact that we can turn bowel cancer from a common cancer killer to a rare cancer killer.

So, this month we need to start the conversation that will save lives.  We need to Lift the Lid on bowel cancer.  Please do all you can.  Twenty years ago we didn't talk about breast or prostate cancer.  Now we know that they can be beaten and that we need to be more aware to save lives.  I want us all to do the same for bowel cancer.