European Cancer Screening Policy Index 2026

Cancer screening saves lives.

Across Europe, survival rates for many cancers are significantly higher – up to 13 times higher – when the disease is detected early. By contrast, late-stage detection can reduce survival dramatically, in some cases to below 10% after five years, for cancers such as colorectal and lung cancer. Beyond survival, it is also a key determinant of quality of life, as patients may suffer from lifelong impacts from their disease and treatment.

Not only does early detection work, but it is crucial to reduce the human and financial cost of cancer for people and countries. The issue: we have substantial evidence on how to detect cancer early through screening, but implementation still varies dramatically both between and within countries.

Following the success of the 2024 European Cancer Screening Policy Index, the European Cancer Organisation now launches a new and improved edition, featuring updates in national policies and an upgraded methodology to support progress across Europe.

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The new revised Index provides a comprehensive overview of cancer screening policies and their performance across European countries. It offers a single benchmarking framework to assess progress, identify gaps and support policymakers in strengthening national screening programmes.

Amongst the key findings:

  • Significant disparities in cancer screening policy and performance continue to exist across Europe.
  • Cancer screening policy is advancing, with many countries launching, expanding or updating screening programmes since 2024.
  • Participation in cancer screening remains a major challenge, with screening rates stagnating or declining in several countries.
  • Equity is central to successful cancer screening implementation. Unorganised screening activity is linked to greater social inequalities in access and outcomes.
  • The European Union continues to play an important role through recommendations and support for pilot projects that lay the foundations for organised screening programmes, particularly for lung, prostate and gastric cancers.

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The new Index also underpins the European Cancer Organisation’s policy recommendations presented in the 2025 report, Next Level for Cancer Screening: From Commitments to Continued Action for Early Cancer Detection:

  • Meeting the European Union’s long-term ambitions for cancer screening
  • Promoting collaborative, data-driven improvement of screening programmes
  • Optimising screening programmes through innovation and best practice
  • Advancing early detection within the broader health system context

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See Also

  • Prevention, Early Detection and Screening Network
    Visit
  • Next Level for Cancer Screening: From Commitments to Continued Action for Early Cancer Detection
    Visit

We encourage all stakeholders, advocates and authorities to use the new Policy Index by:

  • Checking your country’s overall performance score
  • Discover the dimensions of your country’s score for each category
  • Explore your country’s policy status and performance through each indicator
  • Take inspiration from other countries’ good practices and their impacts
  • Leverage the data to advance your country’s and the EU’s cancer screening policies

Do you want to partner with the European Cancer Organisation to make the case for cancer screening in your country? Would you like to suggest an update for the information included?

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The European Cancer Screening Policy Index is grounded in the latest evidence-based European guidance in the field, provided under the 2022 EU Council Recommendations on cancer screening. The Index therefore focuses on organised population-based screening activities across six cancer types:

Primary Prevention

Breast cancer screening

Screening

Cervical cancer screening

Quality of Care

Colorectal cancer screening

Informal Carers

Lung cancer screening

Informal Carers

Prostate cancer screening

Informal Carers

Gastric cancer screening

Under these topics, indicators are included that are considered suitable for cross-country comparison and correspond either to:

  • The degree of alignment of implementation features of countries’ cancer screening programmes with the latest EU recommendations (qualitative policy indicators); or,
  • The reach of cancer screening programmes, both in terms of overall target population coverage and equity in participation according to social determinants – levels of education, income and urbanisation (quantitative performance indicators)

Based on these indicators, the Index includes benchmarking scores per category, combined into overall ranking scores, for each country. Details on the selected indicators and corresponding sources, as well as the calculation methods, are available here.