Blood Cancer Awareness Month 1 – 30 September 2025

Blood Cancer Awareness Month is held every September to raise the profile of blood cancer, which doesn’t get the attention of other cancers.

Blood cancer is the fifth most common cancer in the UK, and more critically, the third biggest cancer killer. Yet it remains a hidden cancer.

Because people with blood cancer are being held back by the fact that awareness of blood cancer is much lower than for other common types of cancer (breast, bowel, lung and prostate).

For example:

• Because people with blood cancer often aren’t aware their condition is a type of cancer, they risk missing out on important entitlements like employment protection, free prescriptions and disability benefits, and are less likely to access support from charities. We believe everyone with blood cancer has a right to know they have a type of cancer, though it’s important this news is delivered sensitively.
• People with blood cancer are less likely to leave their diagnosis understanding what is wrong with them than people with other types of cancer. The fact they’re often not told their condition is a type of blood cancer is one of the reasons for this.
• The fact that blood cancer is seen as a group of rarer conditions (leukaemia, lymphoma, myeloma, and others) rather than a type of cancer in its own right means there is less awareness of symptoms among both the public and GPs, and less political focus on improving healthcare.

Learn the shocking statistics

• 78% of people with blood cancer describe blood cancer as a hidden cancer.
• 31% of people with blood cancer have to visit their GP three or more times before being diagnosed.
• 76% of people with blood cancer say they were not told their condition was a type of blood cancer when they were diagnosed.
• 58% of people with blood cancer are not aware of any support available to them when diagnosed.
• 47% of people with blood cancer do not feel part of a community, despite 70% of these people saying it is important to them.

Blood Cancer Awareness Month | Blood Cancer UK

Making sure people leave their diagnosis understanding their condition is blood cancer

The diagnosis is a crucial point in someone’s blood cancer journey, and yet only a quarter of people are told at diagnosis that they have a type of blood cancer.

We also know that people with blood cancer are less likely to leave their diagnosis feeling they fully understand what is wrong with them compared to people with other common cancers. People hearing “a type of blood cancer” – a descriptive term that gives a sense of what is going wrong in the body – should help them understand their diagnosis better than just terms like “leukaemia”, “lymphoma” and “myeloma”, which are derived from Latin and Greek.

Given that 40,000 people are diagnosed every year, introducing the term “blood cancer” at this point could also be a catalyst for raising the profile of the disease.

Over the next few years, we will be working with the health professionals who are involved in diagnosing people – specialist doctors, GPs and cancer nurse specialists – to get to the point where everyone leaves their diagnosis understanding that they have a type of blood cancer.