250,000-person study to investigate the rise of bowel cancer in under-50s
Wessex cancer alliance amongst those supporting the project
Researchers are calling on the UK public to help find the answers to an increase in bowel cancer in the under-50s.
. The PROSPECT-UK study, which Cancer Research UK is funding through Cancer Grand Challenges, aims to recruit 250,000 people aged 18 to 50 to share information that could show how diet, lifestyle and environment might contribute to bowel cancer risk in younger people.
“Over just a few generations, our lifestyles, diets and environments have changed dramatically,” says Professor Sarah Berry, PROSPECT-UK’s lead researcher, from King’s College London. “But we don’t know which of these changes are increasing people’s risk of bowel cancer or which ones could help reduce it. We urgently need large-scale, long-term data to uncover the true causes.”
Bowel cancer has long been considered a disease of older adults, and more than 9 in 10 cases still happen in people over 50.
However, recent studies have shown that bowel cancer incidence rates in younger people are rising around the world, even as they stabilise or fall in older age groups.
In 2024, other researchers from PROSPECT found increasing rates of early-onset bowel cancer in 27 of the 50 countries they looked at. England saw the fourth-fastest rise of any of those countries between 2007 and 2017, faster than any other country in Europe.
Cancer Research UK’s stats tell a similar story: UK-wide, bowel cancer incidence rates in 25 to 49-year-olds have increased by more than 50% since the early 1990s.
PROSPECT-UK is an important step towards understanding what’s behind these increases. It’s an observational study, so it can’t directly prove causes on its own, but people who take part will provide crucial information to help researchers identify some of the likeliest culprits and guide the next phases of research.
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