Denis Campbell, Caroline Bannock – The Guardian April 29, 2020

Almost 18,000 more people with cancer in England could die after the coronavirus pandemic led hospitals to suspend treatment and deterred patients from seeking NHS care, research has found.

Cancer experts claim that an extra 6,270 people in England who have been newly diagnosed with the disease could die from it over the next 12 months as a direct result of the disruption caused by coronavirus, and the additional toll taking into account all those living with cancer could be 17,915.

That is an increase of 20% on the 89,576 deaths among cancer patients recorded annually in England, according to the latest available statistics.

The UK hospital death toll from coronavirus stands at 21,678, and more than 4,300 people have died in care homes in the past fortnight, bringing the total to more than 26,000 Covid-19 deaths since the pandemic took hold in Britain.

The new analysis sheds light on some of the wider health impacts of the pandemic. Macmillan Cancer Support described the findings as extremely worrying and said cancer should not become “the forgotten C” during the coronavirus crisis.

NHS England has launched a campaign urging people with symptoms of any potentially serious illness to seek help in the normal way by visiting A&E, a GP or dialling 999.

Urgent referrals by GPs for cancer tests have fallen by 76% and appointments for chemotherapy by 60% since the pandemic arrived in February despite NHS England insisting cancer treatment “should continue unaffected”. The health service hopes to resume cancer operations this week but faces a large backlog.

The new research, from University College London (UCL) and Data-Can, a health data research hub for cancer diagnosis and treatment in the UK, is the first to quantify the potential impact of the NHS delaying many forms of cancer treatment, including diagnostic tests and operations, and people not wanting to risk going into hospital in case they become infected. It is based on data from the health records of more than 3.5 million patients in England.

While some of the projected additional deaths will be among people with cancer who contract Covid-19, others will occur because diagnosis was late or treatment such as chemotherapy was delayed, the researchers conclude.

“Our findings demonstrate the serious potential for unintended consequences of the response to the Covid-19 pandemic, which may negatively impact on patients with cancer and other underlying health conditions,” said Dr Alvina Lai, a lead author of the study and a lecturer in health data analytics at UCL’s institute of health informatics.

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