Thousands more people may die of cancer after urgent hospital referrals plunged by 250,000 during lockdown compared with last year, report warns
As fewer patients see their GPs with cancer symptoms – before being referred to specialists for scans – the disease is being picked up too late, experts fear.
GPs made 339,242 urgent referrals for people with cancer symptoms between April and June in England, more than 250,000 fewer than the 594,060 figure reported in the same months in 2019.
There are also delays in accessing the necessary treatments and diagnoses once a patient goes to hospital, a study by healthcare management consultancy Carnall Farrar and the Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR) found.