New Guideline Says Women Need Breast Cancer Screenings at Age 40

MILFORD, Del. -  The U.S. Preventative Task Force released a new guideline saying women should start getting breast cancer screenings at the age of 40 instead of the current standard of 50 years of age.  

Dr. Diana Dickson Witmer of Bebee Healthcare said that 40 is a good age to start breast cancer screening but not before 30.

"So only one woman out of 204 women will develop a breast cancer between age 30 and 40, it's not a timeframe where many women are developing cancer," Dickson-Witmer said. 

As of today studies show that women aged 40 to 49 from year 2015 to 2019 saw a 2% increase in breast cancer incidents. Nicole Pickles, Executive Director of Cancer Support Community Delaware said she has an idea why this may have happened. 

"With Covid 19 women didn't get screened in the last three years, so we're seeing more breast cancer because of that fact, breast cancer is being detected later," Pickles said.

Dickson-Witmer said younger people are starting to be diagnosed with breast cancer at a younger rate for a few different reasons. 

"We are obese as a population in increasing percentage, we are physically inactive, Dickson- Witmer said. "We don't do as much physical activity, we don't have children as early as we used to and if we do have children, we don't breastfeed as often", she said. 

But with this new guideline, giving doctors the go ahead to recommend a younger age to start getting screened is something Pickles said will save lives.