The health chief at the centre of the breast cancer screening fiasco today offered a “heartfelt and unreserved” apology.
Public Health England chief executive Duncan Selbie, who has faced calls to quit, insisted the quango was “working round the clock” to put matters right.
Between 135 and 270 women could have died prematurely as a result.
Today Mr Selbie, in his first “Friday message” blog for more than a month, wrote: “When things go wrong, we understand how devastating this can be . . . On behalf of PHE and NHS breast screening services, our apology is heartfelt and unreserved.”
PHE said that a first batch of 67,000 letters inviting women under 72 who missed their final scan to book a new appointment had been sent out.
Mr Selbie said: “Arrangements have been put in place to ensure those affected can access services appropriately, and that those already in the system will not have their care disrupted.”
Women aged 72 and older who wish to have a scan have been told to call a helpline (0800 169 2692). As many as 309,000 surviving women are thought to have missed their final scan.
Mr Hunt has been criticised for using “overheated” estimates of the number of women who may have been adversely affected. About 1,300 women a year aged 50 to 70 are saved by the programme, but 4,000 a year are “over-diagnosed” and may undergo unnecessary treatment — a risk that increases in women over 70.
Professor Paul Pharoah, of Cambridge university, said: “I believe that the furore over the NHS Breast Screening programme error has resulted in un-necessary worry.
Breast cancer screening has both harms and benefits and so, if some people have not been invited for screening they will have avoided the harms as well as missing out on any benefits.”
