A 32-year-old woman is cancer-free after undergoing the UK’s first liver transplant for advanced bowel cancer.

Bianca Perea, a trainee lawyer from Manchester, was diagnosed with the most advanced kind of bowel cancer in November 2021, with doctors telling her they aimed to prolong her life rather than find a cure.

But, alongside other treatments including targeted drug therapy, chemotherapy and surgery, the transplant has been a huge success and Ms Perea now has no signs of cancer anywhere in her body.

Ms Perea first visited her GP in Wigan after feeling constipated and bloated. After tests, a colonoscopy and a biopsy, she was diagnosed with stage four bowel cancer, which had spread to all eight segments of her liver.

Ms Perea accepted the diagnosis, but said she refused to believe the outlook was so bleak.

“I don’t want to sound kind of ignorant or arrogant or anything like that but I just didn’t feel in my gut that that was going to be it,” she said.

Her mother asked about a possible transplant at that stage but was told it was not a feasible treatment.

Ms Perea had 37 rounds of a targeted drug called panitumumab plus chemotherapy for two and a half years.

She had an excellent response to the treatment, which meant she was able to have an operation in May 2023 to remove the bowel tumour.

But scans showed she still had tumours in her liver, which could not be operated on.

Nevertheless, because her response to chemotherapy had been so good and her bowel cancer was seemingly gone, doctors began to look at liver transplants.

Ms Perea was added to the transplant list in February 2024 and was lucky enough to find a donor last summer.

She said: “Within four weeks of going under the knife, I was able to drive and walk the family dogs, it was really quite incredible.

“To go from being told I’d only have a short time to live to now being cancer-free is the greatest gift.

“I’ve been given a second chance at life and I’m going to grab it with both hands. I am so grateful to the family who agreed to donate their loved one’s liver.

“I do believe this is a cure. They’re always hesitant to say that, obviously, but I am cancer-free right now.”

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Now, Ms Perea is looking forward to going on holiday this year and is working on improving her fitness.

“My liver is doing really well,” she said. “I get tests on that, and I’ve just had my second scan and that’s all clear, so it’s really good.”

Dr Kalena Marti, Ms Perea’s oncologist, said: “To see that Bianca has had such a positive outcome is wonderful.

“When we looked at the tumour cells in her liver after it had been removed, they weren’t active.

“This is excellent news, and we hope that this means that the cancer won’t come back.”

She added: “Advanced bowel cancer is complex and there are lots of different types of the disease, so what works for one person might not work for another. As a result, it’s important that we continue to develop new treatments.

“Thanks to the generosity of organ donors and their loved ones, we can now access liver transplants for some patients, which is fantastic.”

You can watch a full interview with Ms Perea at 8.30am this morning on Sky News Breakfast.

Millions of commuters returning to work and school this morning will face more snow, ice and rain, as several weather warnings remain in place across the UK.

More travel disruption is likely due to flooding from heavy rain and thawing snow, the Met Office said, with 97 flood warnings and 262 flood alerts in place.

It comes after most of the country saw heavy snow or icy rain fall over a wintry weekend.

Major airports closed their runways for several hours due to snow, while stranded vehicles and collisions blocked key roads across England.

Follow UK weather updates live

An amber weather warning remains in place until 6am this morning across parts of Lancashire, Cumbria and the Lake District.

Travel delays, stranded vehicles and power cuts are all likely under the warning – while rural communities could be cut off with up to an additional 15cm of snow falling during the period, the Met Office said.

Leeds Bradford Airport warned passengers last night that disruption caused by the bad weather is likely to continue into Monday.

Several yellow weather warnings for snow, ice and rain will remain in place across Britain and Northern Ireland until this afternoon.

The Environment Agency said a combination of melting snow and rain could lead to “significant river flooding”, and advised people to stay away from swollen rivers and not drive through flood water.

Cold air will return and remain across the whole country from Monday onwards after a brief spell of milder conditions in southern areas, the Met Office said.

Deputy chief forecaster Mike Silverstone said: “The low pressure that brought the snow and heavy rain in the south will move out to the east by Monday. This will allow a cold northerly flow to become established again for much of next week.

“This will bring further sleet, snow and hail showers to northern Scotland in particular, but possibly to some other areas, especially near western coasts, with a fair amount of dry and bright weather elsewhere.”

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He added: “Temperatures will remain below average, with widespread frost and the threat of ice at times. Some areas, especially in the north, may struggle to get above freezing for several days.”

Further weather warnings could be issued with the potential for some snow to fall in southern and central England and Wales around the middle of the week, Mr Silverstone said.

You can stay up to date with the latest forecasts and warnings by clicking here.

Sir Keir Starmer will launch his plan to deliver millions more appointments across the NHS and to reduce waiting times to 18 weeks over the next five years.

The prime minister will lay out how greater access to community diagnostic centres (CDCs) will help deliver up to half a million more appointments, alongside 14 new surgical hubs and three expanded existing hubs.

Up to a million appointments could be freed up by giving patients the choice to forego follow-up appointments currently booked by default, the government says.

Overall, the plan will involve a drive to deliver two million extra appointments by the end of next year.

The aim of the reforms is that by the end of March 2026, an extra 450,000 patients will be treated within 18 weeks.

Figures published by NHS England last month showed an estimated 7.54 million treatments were waiting to be carried out at the end of October – the lowest figure since March 2024.

According to the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS), the last time the NHS met the target of 92% of patients receiving treatment within 18 weeks was in 2015.

The reforms for England will also see an overhaul of the NHS app to give patients greater choice over where they choose to have their appointment and will also provide greater detail to the patient including their results and waiting times.

The first step in the digital overhaul will be completed by March 2025, when patients at over 85% of acute trusts will be able to view their appointment details via the NHS app, the government said.

They’ll also be able to contact their provider and receive updates, including how long they are likely to wait for treatment.

In the effort to free-up one million appointments, patients will be given more choice over non-essential follow up appointments, while GPs will also be given funding to receive specialist advice from doctors before they make any referrals.

Sir Keir is expected to say: “This government promised change and that is what I am fighting every day to deliver.

“NHS backlogs have ballooned in recent years, leaving millions of patients languishing on waiting lists, often in pain or fear. Lives on hold. Potential unfulfilled.

“This elective reform plan will deliver on our promise to end the backlogs. Millions more appointments. Greater choice and convenience for patients. Staff once again able to give the standard of care they desperately want to.”

The CDCs will be open 12 hours a day and seven days a week wherever possible. Patients will be able to access a broader range of appointments in locations that are more convenient for them and which may speed up the pace of treatment.

The government believes its plan will help it to deliver the equivalent to 40,000 extra appointments a week in its first year – which was one of Sir Keir’s six key pledges.

Chancellor Rachel Reeve pledged £22bn over the next two years to cut NHS waiting times in her October budget, but some in the sector fear a workforce shortage means the prime minister’s ambitions will be hard to achieve.

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There have been some concerns that giving patients choice of the location of their treatment may see some hospitals in greater demand than others – but Health Secretary Wes Streeting said this was a “matter of principle”.

“When I was diagnosed with kidney cancer, I was inundated with colleagues in parliament who were asking who my surgeon was, whether I was going to the best place for treatment, whether I was exercising my right to choose in the NHS,” he said.

“Now, it turned out I had one of the best kidney cancer surgeons in the country assigned to me by the NHS, so I was lucky.

“But frankly, someone like my mum as a cleaner should have as much choice and power in the NHS as her son, the health secretary.”

NHS chief executive Amanda Pritchard said the government’s plan was an “ambitious blueprint”.

“The radical reforms in this plan will not only allow us to deliver millions more tests, appointments and operations, but do things differently too – boosting convenience and putting more power in the hands of patients, especially through the NHS app.”