Health Secretary Wes Streeting has announced a £237 million investment in community diagnostic centres (CDCs) across England, saying that timely cancer diagnosis 'shouldn't be a question of luck'. The funding will support the opening of four new centres and the expansion of 17 others, with enhancements to 15 more.
The new CDCs will be located in Gorton, Luton, Boston and Bideford, and are expected to open in 2026/27. Streeting described the move as 'part of the biggest expansion in NHS diagnostics in a generation'. The centres aim to provide tests, checks and scans closer to patients' homes, reducing the need for hospital visits.
Speaking about his own experience, Streeting said: 'I was one of the lucky ones – my kidney cancer was caught early, and today I'm living cancer-free. The NHS should be there for all of us when we need it, catching illness earlier so we can treat it faster.' He emphasised that the NHS should 'fit around people's lives', allowing patients to access diagnostics while shopping or on the school run.
The announcement comes ahead of the release of the NHS's latest performance figures, which show the waiting list for routine treatment at its lowest since early 2023, with 7.25 million treatments waiting. However, only 72.8% of patients urgently referred for suspected cancer were diagnosed or had cancer ruled out within 28 days in January, down from 77.4% in December.
Professor Stella Vig, national clinical director for elective care at NHS England, welcomed the expansion, saying: 'We're making it easier to access care, and our network of community diagnostic centres deliver important diagnostic tests nearer to people's homes. This expansion means even more patients can have vital checks like MRIs, CT scans and ultrasounds in a convenient location.'
