Just as they are about to do their SATS kids will have a new test - for ovarian cancer. To settle their minds. So they know that, in the future, say when they are 40, they have a high chance of getting a disease known as the silent killer.
It's a test that will cost millions, but hey, money well spent! What sort of topsy turvey thinking is this? Why would any child just about to hit puberty want to be told that they have a high risk of developing cancer?Is life not tough enough without that?
Yet Dr Sue Gessler, a psychologist at UCL Hospitals says early testing would help women," to live with the uncertainty," adding, " If you test a girl before puberty it will let the child know, at whatever level they understand, that this is something that will happen to them in later life."
I'm sure that child will be immensely grateful to the likes of Dr Gessler, just as I was when I discovered at 14 that I had no need of the BCG vaccination as I had been exposed to TB in the past. I was sure I was going to die, probably within a week.
Was the information helpful? No, it was traumatic, and it all came down to bad communication. Think how this revelation of ovarian cancer would affect a ten-year-old, where the certainty is much more real, and you are talking of a crackpot idea at best, cruelty at worst with the risk of lifelong harm. You know what Dr Gessler ? - we don't want to know!
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