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Cancer is the biggest killer of women in north-east England, healthcare bosses have said.

At a council meeting on Thursday, a North East and North Cumbria Integrated Care Board (ICB) official said: "In our area, cancer is the biggest killer of women – higher than cardiovascular disease, which is the biggest nationally."

Women's health director Siobhan Brown said cervical screening rates varied "dramatically" across the region and that the NHS needed to get better at catching cancer earlier.

"Early detection will mean longer lives, not in ill health," she said. "Women in the North East spend, on average, 21 years in ill health."

She also told the Northumberland County Council meeting that work was being carried out to tackle the problem, according to the

This included improving access to cervical screenings and substance misuse services, she said.

Rates of cervical screening vary from 37.4% to 81.5% in women aged between 25 and 49 across the area the ICB covers, .

But in women aged between 50 and 64, rates vary between 68.4% and 82.7%.

When asked why more deprived communities had worse healthcare access, the council's director of public health Gill O'Neil said: "It’s not only about the physical presence of a service being available, it’s that acceptability of that service, for people to feel it is for them and they can come forward and access it."

She added: "It's wrapped up in a lot of cultural and support mechanisms and about how we can encourage people to access those services."

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