New Colorectal Cancer Screening Advances Highlighted on Today Show as Part of Early Detection Push
Colorectal cancer kills roughly 53,000 Americans every year — making it the second leading cause of cancer death in the United States — and the frustrating part is that it doesn't have to. Caught early, it's one of the most treatable cancers there is. The problem has never been the treatment options. It's been getting people screened before symptoms appear. NBC's Today show tackled that gap on March 2, featuring a segment with medical contributor Dr. Cedrek McFadden that walked viewers through what's changed in colorectal cancer detection and why those changes matter for the average person watching at home.
The timing is deliberate. Early March marks the beginning of a sustained public health awareness push around colorectal cancer, and mainstream media segments like this one are part of a broader effort to normalize screening conversations — particularly for younger adults, who are facing rising rates of early-onset colorectal cancer at ages that previous screening guidelines weren't designed to catch.
Why the Screening Conversation Has Changed
The most significant shift in colorectal cancer guidelines over the past several years has been the lowering of the recommended starting age for routine screening. The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force moved its recommendation from age 50 to age 45 in 2021, a change driven by data showing that colorectal cancer rates in adults under 50 have been rising steadily for decades while rates in older adults have declined — the result of better screening uptake in that group. The guideline change means millions more Americans are now eligible for screening who weren't before.
The awareness gap is significant. Many adults between 45 and 50 haven't internalized that they're now in a screening-eligible age group, and primary care physicians don't always initiate the conversation proactively. Television segments like the Today show feature reach an audience that may not be getting that information through the healthcare system — and in the case of colorectal cancer, reaching people before symptoms develop is the entire point.
The Diagnostic Tools That Have Advanced
Colonoscopy remains the gold standard for colorectal cancer screening — it's the only method that can both detect and remove precancerous polyps in a single procedure. But the barrier to colonoscopy uptake has always been the preparation process and the procedure itself, which requires sedation and a full day off from normal activities. Those practical obstacles lead a meaningful percentage of eligible people to delay or avoid screening entirely.
Stool-based testing has expanded significantly as an alternative screening pathway for average-risk individuals. The fecal immunochemical test — commonly called FIT — is a straightforward at-home test that detects blood in the stool and requires no bowel prep, no dietary restrictions, and no clinic visit. Done annually, it has meaningful sensitivity for colorectal cancer and high-risk polyps. The multi-target stool DNA test, marketed as Cologuard, combines FIT with DNA biomarker detection and is approved for every-three-year screening in average-risk adults.
CT colonography — sometimes called virtual colonoscopy — has also become more widely available and offers a less invasive imaging alternative to optical colonoscopy for people who can't or won't undergo the traditional procedure. It still requires bowel prep, but eliminates the sedation and the procedural risk. The landscape of screening options is genuinely broader than it was a decade ago, which is one of the key messages the Today show segment was designed to convey.
The Early-Onset Colorectal Cancer Problem
The rising rate of colorectal cancer in adults under 50 is one of the more alarming trends in oncology over the past two decades, and researchers still don't have a complete explanation for it. Dietary factors — particularly the consumption of ultra-processed foods, red and processed meat, and low dietary fiber intake — are believed to play a role. Obesity, sedentary behavior, and changes in gut microbiome composition have also been proposed as contributing factors. But none of these fully accounts for the magnitude of the increase observed.
What makes early-onset colorectal cancer particularly concerning is that it tends to be diagnosed at later stages, partly because younger patients and their physicians are less likely to consider colorectal cancer when symptoms like rectal bleeding, changes in bowel habits, or abdominal pain present. Those symptoms get attributed to hemorrhoids or irritable bowel syndrome while the actual diagnosis is delayed. Dr. McFadden's segment specifically addresses this pattern, encouraging younger adults to take those symptoms seriously rather than assuming age protects them.
Who Needs to Screen Earlier Than 45
The age-45 recommendation applies to average-risk individuals. People with elevated risk factors — including a first-degree family member diagnosed with colorectal cancer or advanced polyps, a personal history of inflammatory bowel disease, or certain inherited genetic syndromes like Lynch syndrome or familial adenomatous polyposis — should begin screening earlier and more frequently. Current guidelines recommend screening at age 40, or 10 years before the youngest affected family member's diagnosis age, whichever comes first, for people with a family history.
African Americans face a disproportionately high colorectal cancer burden — higher incidence and mortality rates than white Americans — a disparity driven by a combination of access barriers, screening underutilization, and potentially biological factors that researchers are still investigating. Several major medical organizations have historically recommended that Black Americans begin screening at 45 or earlier, and ensuring that recommendation reaches Black communities is one of the specific goals of early March awareness efforts.
The Practical Message for Viewers
The value of a Today show segment on colorectal cancer screening isn't that it provides information unavailable elsewhere — most of what Dr. McFadden covered exists in clinical guidelines and cancer organization resources. The value is the reach and the normalization. Colorectal cancer screening has historically been undersold partly because the topic is uncomfortable to discuss in mainstream contexts. A morning show segment watched by millions of people while they eat breakfast helps move that discomfort threshold in the right direction.
The bottom line from the segment is simple, even if acting on it requires overcoming inertia: if you're 45 or older and haven't been screened, talk to your doctor this month. If you have a family history of colorectal cancer, that conversation should have happened already — and if it hasn't, the time is now. The screening tools available in 2026 are better, less invasive, and more accessible than they've ever been. The barrier is awareness, not options.
