Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether the Government has made an assessment of the potential merits of reducing the cervical cancer screening age.

The United Kingdom National Screening Committee looked at the starting age for cervical cancer screening in 2012 and recommended inviting women for screening from the age of 25 based on the evidence that screening women under the age of 25 causes more harm than good; that changes are very common in the young cervix, and approximately one in three women under 25 would be identified by a screening test as requiring further investigation. In the vast majority of these younger women, the abnormalities will clear up of their own accord. Further information is available here:

https://legacyscreening.phe.org.uk/cervicalcancer