cancer Treatment follows a familiar pattern. Doctors identify symptoms, diagnose the disease, and begin treatment.

But scientists are now exploring fundamental changes in the way we approach cancer. Instead of waiting for tumors to appear, they want to detect diseases decades before they develop.

This approach is called “Cancer prevention”. The idea is simple. They target the biological processes that cause cancer long before tumors form.

Researchers are looking for subtle early warning signs. These include genetic mutations that silently accumulate within our cells and confer advantages over our cells. immune defense.

They also look for precancerous lesions such as moles and polyps. Early visible changes within the organization. All of these appear long before cancer becomes apparent.

Extensive genetic research has revealed that as people age, small groups of mutated cells called clones accumulate in their bodies, which silently multiply. Scientists have studied this particularly well in blood.

These clones can help predict who is likely to develop blood cancers such as leukemia. Genetics, inflammation, and environmental factors have a strong influence on them.

Importantly, doctors can measure and track these changes over time. This opens up possibilities for early intervention.

16 years study They tracked around 7,000 women to find out how these mutations work. Some mutations helped the clones multiply faster, while others made them particularly susceptible to inflammation.

When inflammation occurred, these sensitive clones proliferated. Analyzing these patterns can help researchers identify people who are more likely to develop cancer in the future.

It’s not a sudden event

This research revealed something fundamental about cancer. It is not a sudden event that immediately causes a tumor to develop.

Instead, cancer progresses through a slow, multistep process, with warning signs detected along the way. These early signs can be powerful targets for stopping cancer before it starts.

Scientists are developing blood tests that detect cancer long before symptoms appear. These tests are called Multi-Cancer Early Detection Tests (MCED), and they look for small pieces of DNA in your blood.

MCED works by looking for circulating tumor DNA, or ctDNA, fragments of DNA released into the bloodstream by cancerous or precancerous cells. Even very early cancers release this DNA, so tests can pick up the disease long before it shows up on a scan.

Results so far look promising. MCED can improve survival rates, especially with early detection of colorectal cancer. When doctors diagnose colorectal cancer at stage 1, 92% of patients survive five years. However, only 18% of those infected at stage 4 survive that far.

However, testing is not perfect. They are missing some cancers entirely and positive results are still needed Follow-up inspection To confirm.

Still, research suggests that MCED could be important for detecting cancers that usually go unnoticed until much later. The potential to save lives is huge.

Cardiologists are already taking a similar approach. They use age, blood pressure, cholesterol and family history to calculate a person’s risk and prescribe drugs such as statins. years before a heart attack.

Cancer researchers hope to emulate this model. They envision combining genetic mutations, environmental factors, and MCED results to guide early cancer prevention.

However, cancer differs from heart disease in important ways. Cancer does not follow a predictable path, and some early lesions shrink or do not progress at all.

There is also a risk of overdiagnosis. Being told you’re at high risk when you feel perfectly healthy can be anxiety-inducing.

Unlike statins, which have broad effects on different cardiovascular risk groups, the efficacy of cancer prevention tools also varies widely. Risk-based models are promising but require careful handling.

Treating cancer risk, not cancer itself, causes difficulties ethical questions. When a person feels perfectly healthy, it becomes difficult to determine whether an intervention is truly helpful.

There is a risk of causing unnecessary worry and harm. Scientists warn that doctors may overestimate the benefits and underestimate the risks, especially in older people.

MCED tests include unique tests ethical concerns. Accuracy isn’t the only thing that matters.

This test can show signs of cancer even when no cancer is present, leading to follow-up scans or biopsies that the patient doesn’t actually need. The anxiety caused by all of this has high costs for both patients and the healthcare system.

Health inequalities can be further exacerbated if these tests are expensive or only available privately. This concern is most acute in low-income countries.

In the United States, drug regulators are investigating how the MCED blood test works. They are considering how reliable the tests need to be and what follow-up doctors should require. Keep patients safe.

The UK is also following suit. of national cancer plan The report for England, published on 4 February 2026, commits to delivering 9.5 million additional diagnostic tests each year through the NHS by March 2029.

Related: Hidden warning signs discovered in the gut may increase cancer risk

The plan calls for continuing ctDNA biomarker testing for lung cancer and breast cancer. If proven, it could be applied to other cancers as well. cost effective.

What all of this shows is clear. Cancer does not appear suddenly. It’s a steady process that begins decades ago. If we can catch them before they grow, countless lives could be saved. The question now is how to do that safely, fairly and effectively.

Ahmed ElbediwySenior Lecturer in Cancer Biology and Clinical Biochemistry; kingston university and Nadine WehidaSenior Lecturer in Genetics and Molecular Biology; kingston university

This article is republished from conversation Under Creative Commons License. please read original article.