Source: nytimes.com Author: Natasha Singer "Don’t forget to check your neck,” says an advertising campaign encouraging people to visit doctors for exams to detect thyroid cancer. In another cancer awareness effort, Representative Debbie Wasserman Schultz, a Florida Democrat, has more than 350 House co-sponsors for her bill to promote the early detection of breast cancer in young women, teaching them about screening methods like self-exams and genetic testing. Meanwhile, the foundation of the American Urological Association has a prostate cancer awareness campaign starring Hall of Fame football players. “Get screened,” Len Dawson, a former Kansas City Chiefs quarterback, says in a public service television spot. “Don’t let prostate cancer take you out of the game.” Nearly every body part susceptible to cancer now has an advocacy group, politician or athlete with a public awareness campaign to promote routine screening tests — even though it is well established that many of these exams offer little benefit for the general public. An upshot of the decades-long war on cancer is the popular belief that healthy people should regularly examine their bodies or undergo screening because early detection saves lives. But in fact, except for a few types of cancer, routine screening has not been proven to reduce the death toll from cancer for people without specific symptoms or risk factors — like a breast lump or a family history of cancer — and could even lead to harm, many experts on health say. That is why the continued rollout of screening campaigns, [...]