Cliff Richard has revealed he has been treated for prostate cancer for the past year. The 85-year-old singer said his cancer had “gone at the moment” and backed calls for a national screening test for men.
In an interview with ITV’s Good Morning Britain on Monday, he said: “I don’t know whether it’s going to come back. We can’t tell those sort of things but we need to, absolutely, I’m convinced, get there, get tested, get checked.”
He said he was diagnosed after a health check for his insurance ahead of a concert tour of Australia and New Zealand.
“The good fortune was that it was not very old, and the other thing is that it has not metastasised. Nothing had moved into bones or anything like that.”
The singer, known for decades of hits including The Young Ones, We Don’t Talk Anymore and Summer Holiday, described the lack of a national screening programme as “absolutely ridiculous”.
“We have governments to look after our country and those who live in that country, so I can’t see how you can say, ‘Oh we can do this, we can do that, but we don’t do this for these people,’” Richard said.
“We all deserve to have the same ability to have a test and then start treatments really early. It seems to me – I’ve only been for one year now in touch with cancer, but every time I’ve talked with anybody this has come up and so I think our government must listen to us.”
The king last week said his cancer treatment would be reduced in the new year, and Richard said he was keen to join forces to raise awareness.
“I’ve been involved with many charities over the years and if the king is happy to front it for us, I’m sure loads of people, I certainly would join him.
“If the king is listening, I think most of us would say, ‘Yeah, we’re available.’”
Richard was interviewed by the former Sky News presenter Dermot Murnaghan, who announced his diagnosis with stage four prostate cancer in June.
Afterwards Murnaghan, 67, spoke to GMB presenters Susanna Reid and Richard Madeley about his own diagnosis and encouraged men to get themselves tested.
He said: “I was ill. I fell ill. I’m stage 4, so I was on a long holiday far away from these shores, and felt awful and put it down to jet lag or an infection … rapidly understood that I was really bad, and flew back here and went straight into A&E, straight into a hospital bed.
“So that’s how silly I was, that if I had a test, I don’t know however many years, how long it had been developing within me, but if I’d had a test earlier, then, you know, the earlier you catch it, it goes for most cancers, the earlier you catch it, the better the treatment is, or the better the prognosis.”
In November, Murnaghan expressed his disappointment when the UK National Screening Committee (UKNSC) said prostate cancer screening should not be made routinely available for the vast majority of men in the UK because it “is likely to cause more harm than good”.
The committee has, however, put forward a recommendation to screen men with BRCA1 and BRCA2 genetic mutations, which puts them at far higher risk of prostate cancer, every two years, between the ages of 45 and 61.
Chiara De Biase, director of health services, equity and improvement at Prostate Cancer UK, said: “We’re glad to hear that Sir Cliff Richard found his prostate cancer at an early stage and has had successful treatment.
“We thank him for sharing his story and in doing so raising vital awareness of this disease, which is completely curable if found early. But men’s lives should not be left to chance. We lose 12,000 dads, brothers, sons and friends to this disease every year.
“Prostate cancer is the last major cancer without a mass screening programme, and it’s about time for change.”
