Screening newborn babies for cystic fibrosis makes sense because it saves money and gives the baby a better chance, analysis has shown.

Babies are regularly screened for the condition in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, but this is not yet the case for all areas of England, including London.

The study, published in The Lancet, compares the outcomes after early screening with simply waiting for symptoms to emerge. It shows that savings on treatment, including hospital admissions, are sufficient in those screened to pay for the cost of all screening.

Erika Sims, of the University of East Anglia, Norwich, and researchers from the University of Dundee, used data from the UK cystic fibrosis database for 2002 to carry out the study.

They compared the treatment costs of 184 children, aged 1-9, in whom the disease was diagnosed through screening, and those of 950 children, in the same age group, where the disease was diagnosed clinically.

Therapy for the clinical diagnoses cost an estimated 60-400 per cent more than therapy where the diagnoses were made by newborn screening, the study found.

Cystic fibrosis screening hit the headlines in November 2006, when Gordon Brown, the Chancellor, announced that his son, Fraser, had had the disease diagnosed.

Ministers promised universal screening as long ago as 2001, and it is now being extended across England.

The life-threatening illness disrupts the way the digestive and respiratory system works and affects five babies born each week in Britain.

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