Lobular breast cancer must no longer be forgotten – join our fight, Wes Streeting
Helen and her plastic surgery team
4 min read
Invasive lobular breast cancer is the second most common type of breast cancer.
First discovered over 50 years ago, 22 people a day are diagnosed with it in the UK. Despite its prevalence, this disease remains under-researched, underfunded and poorly understood. Consequently, there is no specific treatment, and that is why it is known to some as a ‘forgotten cancer’.
Cruelly, it frequently fails to show on mammograms and ultrasounds, making late diagnosis of the disease a common theme, with subsequent poorer outcomes. And this is the reality for a truly courageous woman whom I had the privilege of getting to know over the last year.
Dr Susan Michaelis lived in the UK for 20 years and was the first Australian to have received a British Citizen Award. That was for a quarter of a century of campaigning on health and safety in aircraft, which is another remarkable story entirely.
Susan’s cancer journey started in 2013 with a tiny 1mm mark appearing on her left breast. A mammogram and ultrasound were reassuring, but six months later the mark was developing. It took a biopsy to reveal she had invasive lobular breast cancer, with post-surgery pathology revealing a 7.5cm tumour, where a mammogram and ultrasound had previously seen nothing.
Despite being on hormone therapy treatment for many years, by 2021 the disease had progressed and become incurable. Flying in the face of adversity, Susan and her husband Tristan decided to do something to help the 1,000 people a day globally who are diagnosed with the disease. In 2023 they formed the Lobular Moon Shot Project, with the goal of raising the £20m needed by scientists to carry out a five-year research project.
Helen and Dr Susan Michaelis
And that’s when I came in. In 2024 Susan visited me in Westminster to seek political support in my role as an MP, and because I am a recent survivor of lobular breast cancer. Hearing Susan’s story reconfirmed how extremely fortunate I had been. After attending a standard NHS mammogram check in 2023, suspicions were raised by an eagle-eyed radiologist. Several further procedures eventually led to a confirmed diagnosis, but in its very early stages. I went on to have surgery and I feel blessed to be able to report that almost two years hence, I remain cancer-free. Early diagnosis saved me – which is why the Lobular Moon Shot Project has my 100 per cent backing.
Susan then gained the agreement of Victoria Atkins, then health secretary, to fund the £20m project. Unfortunately, the change in administration after July 2024 meant Susan and her team had to start again. One year later, they now have over 370 MPs from all parties supporting the project.
Susan has said the Manchester Breast Centre is ready to do the work in collaboration with identified partners. She put the £20m ‘ask’ into perspective by equating it to under £240 for each of the people who will be diagnosed with the disease, in the UK alone, in the next 10 years. She also highlighted that secondary breast cancer is the biggest killer of woman aged 35 to 64 and that funding the project would save the NHS millions, save lives and show that Britain leads the way in lobular breast cancer research.
Susan was due to have a meeting with the current Health Secretary on July 14 but, very sadly, she passed away peacefully last week, wearing her Lobular Moon Shot Project T-shirt. Campaigners will now meet with him. I urge Mr Streeting to heed the backing of so many colleagues across the House and provide the ‘moon shot’ funding this critical project truly deserves.
Helen Grant is Conservative MP for Maidstone and Malling