Melanoma Focus Respond to the Government’s 10 Year Plan for Health and Care in England

The Government is currently working on developing a 10 Year Plan for health and care in England. We have responded to the consultation on the Plan and an overview of what our response covered is below.

We highlighted the increasing numbers of people with melanoma and – with 86% of cases of melanoma being preventable- prioritised the need to reduce the incidence rate.  As part of our call for a preventative strategy  to tackle melanoma caused by UV radiation from excessive exposure, we asked for the following actions to be taken:

• Investment in campaigns to raise awareness of the risks of excessive UV exposure from both the sun and sunbeds, as well as awareness of the signs and symptoms of skin cancer that people should look out for.
• Improving access to sunscreen, including by abolishing VAT on factor 30+ sunscreen and ensuring access to sunscreen at outdoor events.
• Tackling the use of sunbeds through raising awareness of the risks and taking steps to reduce ease of access.

In addition to the focus on prevention, our response considered the use of AI in the diagnostic pathway. We called for ongoing reviews of the accuracy of current AI already in use as well as the need to ensure that developments from other companies and at other points in the diagnostic pathway are kept under consideration.

There will be more opportunities for people to feed into the development of the plan and you can find out more about it here.