Forty Years of Daffodil Day

Daffodil Day falls on Thursday 20 August this year, and it is the fortieth. Cancer Council held the first one in 1986.

It is worth pausing on what has changed in between. When Daffodil Day began, around 46 per cent of Australians diagnosed with cancer were still alive five years later. Today that figure is about 72 per cent.

That shift did not come from one discovery. It came from a long accumulation of research, better treatments, and — the part that involves the rest of us — cancers being found earlier, when there is more that can be done about them.

The unglamorous half of the story

Research gets the headlines. Screening does not, and it should.

Australia runs three national cancer screening programs, and each one is designed to find something before it causes symptoms.

Bowel. A free test that arrives in the post, done at home, for people in the eligible age range. It looks for traces of blood invisible to the eye. The kit sits on a lot of kitchen benches unopened, which is the single biggest problem with it.

Breast. Free mammograms through BreastScreen for women in the target age range, generally every two years. No referral needed.

Cervical. The Cervical Screening Test replaced the old Pap smear and is done every five years for most people. Self-collection is now an option, which has made a real difference to people who put it off.

There is also a National Lung Cancer Screening Program, which began in July 2025 for people who meet its criteria.

Symptoms are not the starting gun

The reason screening matters is that most of these cancers cause no symptoms in their early stages. Waiting to feel unwell is waiting for the disease to be further along than it needs to be.

If you have symptoms — anything persistent and unexplained — that is a separate conversation and it should not wait for a screening interval to come around.

Where to start

If you are not sure which programs you are eligible for, or whether you are up to date with any of them, it is an easy thing to raise at an ordinary appointment. It usually takes less time than people expect.

You can also check your own screening history through your Medicare online account or the myGov app.

And if you would like to support Daffodil Day itself, Cancer Council's site has the details.

---

Sources: Cancer Council Australia, Daffodil Day; Australian Government Department of Health, National Cancer Screening Programs.