Cervical screening: little change in a decade with around one in five women still not screened within five years

About one in five eligible women in England have not had cervical screening within the last five years – broadly the same as a decade ago – according to a Health and Social Care Information Centre (HSCIC) report. At 31 March 2012, 78.6 per cent of eligible women aged 25 to 64 had been screened at least once in the previous five years. This percentage, known as coverage, is the same as the previous year but three percentage points lower than in 2002 (81.6 per cent). Today’s report; Cervical Screening Programme, England, 2011-12, is used to inform policy and to monitor the quality and