Leading cancer experts have called for a push to double lung cancer survival rates in the UK and remove huge national inequalities that currently exist in care.

The UK Lung Cancer Coalition has put together a 12-point plan to develop earlier diagnosis’ and better treatment and provide more funding for research.

UK survival rates are among the worst in Europe with half of all lung cancer patients dying within six months.

A recent analysis found only Malta had a lower five-year survival rate of lung cancer in Europe, The Daily Mail reported last week. Only 8.2 per cent are still alive five years after diagnosis in Scotland and 8.4 per cent in England, compared to 16.8 per cent in Iceland.

Dame Gill Oliver, chair of the UKLCC said. “One of the problems is people present to their doctor late because they don’t understand what the symptoms of lung cancer are.

“Also there is a degree of stigma attached to lung cancer as a smoker’s disease although some people with the disease have never smoked.

“And there can be a degree of nihilism among some physicians.”

Lung cancer is the UK’s biggest cancer killer, causing 33,000 deaths each year. This is more than breast cancer, prostate cancer, bladder cancer and leukaemia combined. The disease accounts for one in 20 of all deaths in the UK.