Cancer Treatment and Research During the COVID-19 Pandemic: Experience of the First 6 Months
Begoña de las Heras, Kamal S. Saini, Frances Boyle, Felipe Ades, Evandro de Azambuja, Ivana Božović‐Spasojević, Marco Romano, Marta Capelán, Rajeev Prasad, Pugazhenthi Pattu, Christophe Massard, Chia C. Portera, Monika Lamba Saini, Brajendra Prasad Singh, Ramachandran Venkitaraman, Richard McNally, Manuela Leone, Enrique Grande, Sudeep Gupta
Abstract
The coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has had a significant impact on patients with underlying malignancy. In this article, we summarize emerging data related to patients with cancer and COVID-19. Among patients with COVID-19, a higher proportion have an underlying diagnosis of cancer than seen in the general population. Also, patients with malignancy are likely to be more vulnerable than the general population to contracting COVID-19. Mortality is significantly higher in patients with both cancer and COVID-19 compared with the overall COVID-19-positive population. The early months of the pandemic saw a decrease in cancer screening and diagnosis, as well as postponement of standard treatments, which could lead to excess deaths from cancer in the future.