Charity warns up to 3500 people in Yorkshire with undiagnosed cancer
The number of diagnosis in the last year has plunged
A North Yorkshire cancer charity has warned there could be up to 3500 people across the county with an undiagnosed cancer.
The number of diagnosis in the last twelve months have plunged in comparison to previous years, so Yorkshire Cancer Research fear there could be thousands of people across the region who don't know that they have cancer.
The pandemic has meant treatments have been delayed, appointments have been cancelled and people have refrained from visiting their GPs for fear of putting pressure on the NHS, but the charity say this has created a "perfect storm" of problems.
Amy Deptford, Policy Officer at Yorkshire Cancer Research, has warned getting levels back to what they were before won't be enough. She said: "We have to return cancer services as soon as possible to what they were, but equally recognising that getting services back to pre-pandemic levels isn't enough. It needs to go further.
"The pandemic has significantly disrupted cancer treatments. Appointments have been cancelled and pushed back. Lots of people haven't been checked because people were worried about catching Covid or they didn't want to put a burden on the NHS and what we've seen is this has created the perfect storm."
The charity has joined forces with 47 other charities to form the One Cancer Voice group to recognise that cancer services need to go further and faster than ever before.
They're calling on the Government and NHS leaders across the UK to commit to directing resources to clear the cancer backlog as quickly as possible as well as investing in the workforce and diagnostic capacity.
They're also urging the Government to put out messages to encourage people to get checked now restrictions are easing.
Amy Deptford, added: "That's the thing with cancer; it doesn't wait around just because there is a pandemic.
"The earlier that you catch it and it is diagnosed the better your treatment will be and the better your survival rate."
A report released earlier this week has found cancer patients could end up waiting two years to benefit from new research discoveries.
The Institute of Cancer Research, London said tightened restrictions in response to new coronavirus variants have limited laboratory research time, and slowed the race to find new cancer treatments.
It said at the start of the latest lockdown that the number of researchers able to access labs had fallen by almost 30% on top of restrictions that already existed before Christmas.
Scientists estimated advances in research for cancer patients would be put back by an average of 17 months following the first lockdown, but the ICR now fears the delay could be as much as two years.
The institute has called for extra financial support for cancer research organisations to prevent further delays.