BREAST CANCER SPECIAL
Health Matters
COVID V CANCER
WELLBEING
The message has never been clearer: check your boobs, because cancer that’s detected early is (in most cases) more treatable. The Covid-19 pandemic caused a huge disruption in healthcare services and, according to an analysis of NHS England figures by Cancer Research UK (CRUK), around 10,500 fewer breast cancer patients started treatment in the first year of the pandemic in England between April 2020 to March 2021, compared to the same period in 2019.*
An uncomfortable statistic, but with normality slowly resuming, where are we now? “Breast cancer services are facing high levels of demand and the NHS is working hard to get through the waiting lists,” says Dr Jodie Moffat from CRUK. However, recent data released by the NHS suggests the number of patients starting treatment for breast cancer in England is now similar to what would have been expected for this period in the absence of Covid-19 – welcome news.