A Gwaun Valley grandmother, who received a scam email saying she possibly had cancer, has warned people to be on their guard.

Mrs Bonni Davies received an email claiming to be from the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence, saying that her white blood cell count was very low and "unfortunately we have a suspicion of cancer".

Mrs Davies received the email while she was away at a meeting in Birmingham.

"I opened my e-mails during lunch time. I had had a blood test recently, had been asked to go back for a second and am now waiting to go for the third blood test. My heart did miss a beat when I read it, but due to the spelling and grammar mistakes it did strike me as not being genuine. I called my colleague over to see what she thought. She also thought it was a hoax and advised me to go to the nice.org.uk website," she said.

The NICE website has highlighted the spam email warning people to delete it without opening it.

Sir Andrew Dillon, NICE Chief Executive says: "A spam email purporting to come from NICE is being sent to members of the public regarding cancer test results. This malicious email is not from NICE and we are currently investigating its origin. We take the matter very seriously and have reported it to the police."

Mrs Davies' GP surgery in Newport has also had several phone calls from patients who had received the hoax emails.

"I want people to be made aware of the scam and hopefully not be upset by it," she said.