I’d love to do a study of column inches of negative trials versus positive ones. This Swedish study in the BMJ, published on the 31st March, found that over 20 years of screening, in almost 1500 men, there was no change in death rate from prostate cancer whether you had prostate cancer screening or not. As I write, the Prostate Cancer Charity has not responded to this paper on their website. (They did, however, respond to news of a potential biomarker for prostate cancer, which hadn’t been tested thoroughly, and also commentated on the “scepticism among some GPs are major hurdles for men in exercising their right to request a simple test” which is interesting, because if PSA testing is one thing, it isn’t simple). It’s not mentioned in the Prostate Foundation’s ‘news’ section. Neither is it mentioned in Prostate Actions’ news either.

Do charities have a bias in what news they report to their supporters?