Has the repurposing of health services during pandemic led to a 'cancer epidemic' in Europe?
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Europe may soon face a 'cancer epidemic' unless urgent action is taken to boost treatment and research of the disease. According to a report, an estimated 1 million diagnoses were missed due to the pandemic.
A report in The Guardian states that the healthcare sector focused on COVID-19 which affected cancer research and treatment across the continent. Experts feel if it is not addressed urgently, it may set back cancer outcomes by almost a decade.
A report, European Groundshot – Addressing Europe’s Cancer Research Challenges: a Lancet Oncology Commission brought together a wide range of patient, scientific, and healthcare experts with detailed knowledge of cancer across Europe.
One of the major side effects of the pandemic was the adverse effects of rapid repurposing of health services and lockdowns have had on cancer services, cancer research, and on patients with cancer.
“To emphasize the scale of this problem, we estimate that about 1 million cancer diagnoses might have been missed across Europe during the Covid-19 pandemic,” experts wrote in The Lancet Oncology. “There is emerging evidence that a higher proportion of patients are diagnosed with later cancer stages compared with pre-pandemic rates as a result of substantial delays in cancer diagnosis and treatment. This cancer stage shift will continue to stress European cancer systems for years to come.”
"These issues will ultimately compromise survival and contribute to inferior quality of life for many European patients with cancer."
The report states that clinicians found 1.5 million fewer patients with cancer in the first year of the pandemic. The report also states that one in two patients with cancer did not receive timely surgery or chemotherapy.
About 100 million screenings were missed, and it is estimated that as many as 1 million European citizens may have undiagnosed cancer as a result of the backlog.
“We estimate that approximately 1 million cancer diagnoses were missed across Europe during the Covid-19 pandemic,” said Prof Mark Lawler, of Queen’s University Belfast, the chair and lead author of the commission. “We are in a race against time to find those missing cancers.”
The report also highlights that the pandemic has also affected the desired funding that is needed for cancer prevention efforts and research.
The report points out that the greater the prevention, the more it would reduce the number of people affected by the deadly disease and therefore lead to availability of more resources for those who do require treatment.
