The latest figures bring forth a worrisome trend that reveal that young women are shying away from undergoing the screening for cervical cancer. The figures bring out that the Pap test rates have been falling gradually with 10% fall being witnessed every two years.

Further, for the women falling in the age bracket of 20-69 years, the rate for the screening since 199-97 has dropped by 1.4%.

Disturbed by the trend, Kate Broun, Manager of PapScreen Victoria said, “Some younger women think that cervical cancer won’t happen to them. Only one in two Australian women aged 20-29 are having a Pap test every two years, compared to two in three older women, which is obviously concerning to us”.

The reason for the low figures is attributed to the difficulties faced in the screening of cervical cancer.

It was highlighted in the findings of a 2009 telephone survey that Pap screening was considered as an uncomfortable or painful process. All the surveyed 1000 women in Victoria, also, said that they found it extremely difficult to squeeze out time for a test. What was more shocking was that all the women did not seem to understand the purpose of a Pap test.