THE family of a young Merseyside mother who died of cervical cancer has taken a campaign to lower the screening age to Downing Street.

Kirsty Winstanley died aged 23 in August, leaving behind a son, Aiden.

Today her family took a petition signed by more than 22,000 people to London to put pressure on the Government.

It calls for the screening age in England to be lowered from 25 to 20.

Women in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland are screened from 20 but the screening age in England was moved to 25 in 2003.

That was on advice from the International Agency for Research on Cancer, Cancer Research UK and the independent Advisory Committee on Cervical Screening.

They argued that few women under 25 develop cancer and screening can lead to unnecessary and harmful investigations for symptoms that may clear up by themselves.

Miss Winstanley, from Rainhill in St Helens , died 10 months after being diagnosed.

Her brother Ian Atherton said: "She felt bitter that she didn’t have the chance to save her own life.

"If the Government hadn’t raised the screening age from 20 to 25 in 2003, she could have had the opportunity to have the smear test, and could have caught it.

"She would have had two years from 20 to 22 to catch this disease, and actually be able to survive."