Cancer: Diagnosis

(asked on 17th November 2020) - View Source

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment he has made of the implications for his policies of the projected reduction in cancer diagnoses in 2020 via GP referral and screening.


Answered by
Jo Churchill Portrait
Jo Churchill
Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
This question was answered on 22nd December 2020

No assessments of the full effect of the Covid-19 pandemic on NHS services can be made until the pandemic is over and the data is available in full.

One of the key priorities for cancer services is to restore the number of people coming forward and being referred with suspected cancer, and therefore having diagnostic tests, to at least pre-pandemic levels. By September 2020, the latest data published, urgent referrals were at the same levels in 2019. We are continuing to monitor this and are further encouraging anyone with symptoms to come forward to their general practitioners through our ‘Help Us Help You’ public awareness campaign.

To support this, systems are ensuring sufficient diagnostic capacity in COVID-19 secure environments. Endoscopy capacity is being increased, and the capacity of surgical hubs expanded to meet demand. Specific actions are being put in place to support any groups of patients who might have unequal access to diagnostics and/or treatment, and all cancer screening programmes have restarted routine invitations.

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