Why are more young people getting cancer?

One of the reasons the Princess of Wales’s cancer diagnosis felt so shocking is her age. When she addressed the nation from Windsor last week, it brought home the cruelty of a disease that can strike anyone out of the blue.

Cancer is not rare — half of us will get it in our lifetime — but it rarely affects physically fit 42-year-olds, such as Kate.

Of the 375,000 new cancer cases in the UK each year, just one in ten are currently in those aged under 50, but this pattern is changing amid a rising tide of “early-onset” cancer. Research suggests an extra 10,000 adults aged 18-49 are getting a cancer diagnosis each year in the UK compared to the 1990s, a trend that