WOMEN in Ludlow are dying needlessly and often leaving young families to cope without them.

This is the stark message from Dr Caron Morton from the town's Station Drive Surgery who has described the low take-up of cervical smear tests in Ludlow as the biggest public health issue in the town.

“I have cared for women who have died when it need not have happened,” said Dr Morton, who has recently returned to general practice after heading up the Shropshire Clinical Commissioning Group.

The GP says that women in the town who do not have the test are gambling with their lives and more will die needlessly.

Statistics show that the take up of smear tests is lower in Ludlow than elsewhere but why the women of the town are so reluctant to have a simple test that can save their life is a mystery.

Women are offered the routine test that takes just a few minutes every five years and receive a letter inviting them to make an appointment.

Dr Morton does not think the low take-up is because of embarrassment.

“I think that stopped a long time ago,” said Dr Morton.

“My feeling is that it is more to do with lifestyle.

“People are very busy and, with everything that goes on in life, it is not considered a priority and gets put to the back of the queue although the surgery is open from 8am until 8pm so there is plenty of opportunity to have it done.”

But she said it was a lifestyle issue that was also life-threatening with tragic consequences because, by the time cervical cancer symptoms show, the disease has advanced and can be terminal.

“Even when it is not terminal major treatment will be necessary," she said.

“I see women here in Ludlow with cervical cancer and some die leaving young families.

“The test picks up abnormal or pre-cancerous cells that can usually be treated with a fairly standard procedure.”

But if left the condition becomes very serious.

Dr Morton said the problem is a lack of awareness and that at the time that the TV celebrity Jade Goody died of cervical cancer in 2009, at the age of just 27, it was in the public eye and there was a strong take-up of the test.

“Ironically the form of cancer that Jade Goody died from is not detectable from the test but the publicity did make people very aware,” said Dr Morton.

“The problem is that people just forget and sometimes that is very costly.”

A significant feature of cervical cancer is that it is most prevalent in young women and those in early middle-age so just at the time in life when they are most likely to have a young family.

Every year in the UK, more than 3,000 women, mostly under the age of 35, are diagnosed with cervical cancer and almost all cases are caused by Human papillomavirus.

It is estimated that a test will reveal abnormal cells in between seven and nine per cent of women but only a very small percentage of these will be cancer.