Stockport Council shares cancer awareness messages with local businesses

Stockport Council’s Public Health team are working with local employers and community groups across the borough to raise awareness of how people can reduce their risk of cancer and how to try to spot cancer early.

The team have already visited coffee mornings, libraries, mosques and job centres in Stockport among other local venues and are now opening up their offer to local businesses too. Free workshops for employees aim to help dispel myths about cancer and share information about cancer prevention, early diagnosis and cancer screening.

Cancer is a condition that impacts many people and 1 in 2 people will receive a cancer diagnosis in their lifetime. However, cancer survival rates are improving all the time and if cancer is diagnosed early, treatments are much more likely to be effective. For example, if bowel cancer is diagnosed early, 90% of people will survive but if it’s diagnosed late, only 10% of people will survive. By raising awareness of cancer, individuals can feel more confident to know how to reduce their chance of cancer, spot any early cancer warning signs and share the knowledge they have with family and friends, benefiting the wider community too. 

Hayley Taylor-Cox, the Lead for Cancer Prevention at Stockport Council said:

“In the 1970s only 1 in 4 people would survive cancer and now the survival rate has doubled to 2 in 4 people surviving. We’re working towards 3 in 4 people surviving cancer in the next 10 years and we want to share this positive message with local people so we can work together to prevent cancer and spot it early.”

Organisations interested in working with Stockport Council’s Public Health team to raise awareness of cancer warning signs and risks with their colleagues should contact the team via email. Further information about the team’s work can also be found on the Healthy Stockport website.