An NHS double-decker bus will be touring the country, to help raise awareness of the signs and symptoms of cancer and to encourage people to visit their GP for potentially lifesaving checks if they have a symptom.

The giant NHS blue bus, donated by Stagecoach, will visit five areas across the country where early diagnosis rates for cancer are among the lowest. Kicking off its tour, the bus will head to its first stop in Blackburn on Monday 6 February, before moving on to Sunderland, Barnsley, and Leicester and will complete its route in London on Friday 10.

From the bus, teams of NHS staff, alongside nurses from Cancer Research UK, will provide expert advice to help make passers-by aware of common cancer signs and symptoms, the importance of earlier diagnosis, and where they can go for support or further advice.
Part of the health service’s ‘Help Us, Help You’ campaign, the tour is the latest NHS initiative to help drive earlier cancer diagnosis and tackle health inequalities, ultimately improving survival rates, with recent surveys showing over half (53%) say they worry about cancer every few months or more.

The NHS Long Term Plan committed to increasing the number of cancers detected at an early stage one or two from half to three quarters by 2028. Thanks to these awareness-raising campaigns, more people than ever before have had potentially lifesaving NHS cancer checks, with over 2.8 million people seen last year – up by almost a fifth in the same period before the pandemic (2.35 million in 2018/19).

This has had a direct impact on the number of people diagnosed with cancer – with more than 320,000 people receiving treatment for cancer over the last year (Nov 2021 – Oct 2022) – the highest number on record, and up by more than 8,000 in the same period pre-pandemic.