Increase bowel screening: Cancer Council THE national bowel cancer screening program (NBCSP) is working and its full implementation should be speeded up, says the chief executive of Cancer Council Australia. A fully implemented program could save up to 500 lives a year, Professor Ian Olver says in an article in the April 1 issue of the Medical Journal of Australia. Bowel cancer kills about 80 Australians a week but it can be treated successfully if detected in its early stages. Prof Olver's article, co-written with colleague Paul Grogan, says screening could save the lives of up to 40 per cent of victims aged older than 50. The article says early positive results from the program should provide encouragement to the government to "actively promote it to eligible population groups to boost interim participation." An accompanying research report by Stephen Cole of Repatriation General Hospital and Professor Graeme Young of Flinders University confirms the program is effective and aids early detection. The program is being expanded in 2013 to include people turning 60. Those turning 70 will be included from 2015. The Department of Health and Ageing website says that when fully implemented the program will offer people aged from 50 to 74 free screening every two years. The expansion of the program means that more than 12,000 suspected or confirmed cancers will be detected each year and between 300 and 500 lives saved annually. People eligible to participate in the program will receive an invitation through the mail to complete a simple test in the privacy of their own home and mail it to a pathology laboratory for analysis.