Predicted long‐term impact of COVID ‐19 pandemic‐related care delays on cancer mortality in Canada
The COVID‐19 pandemic has affected cancer care worldwide. This study aimed to estimate the long‐term impacts of cancer care disruptions on cancer mortality in Canada using a microsimulation model. The model simulates cancer incidence and survival using cancer incidence, stage at diagnosis and surviv...
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| Published in: | International journal of cancer Vol. 150; no. 8; pp. 1244 - 1254 |
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| Main Authors: | , , , , |
| Format: | Journal Article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
United States
Wiley Subscription Services, Inc
15.04.2022
John Wiley & Sons, Inc |
| Subjects: | |
| ISSN: | 0020-7136, 1097-0215, 1097-0215 |
| Online Access: | Get full text |
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| Summary: | The COVID‐19 pandemic has affected cancer care worldwide. This study aimed to estimate the long‐term impacts of cancer care disruptions on cancer mortality in Canada using a microsimulation model. The model simulates cancer incidence and survival using cancer incidence, stage at diagnosis and survival data from the Canadian Cancer Registry. We modeled reported declines in cancer diagnoses and treatments recorded in provincial administrative datasets in March 2020 to June 2021. Based on the literature, we assumed that diagnostic and treatment delays lead to a 6% higher rate of cancer death per 4‐week delay. After June 2021, we assessed scenarios where cancer treatment capacity returned to prepandemic levels, or to 10% higher or lower than prepandemic levels. Results are the median predictions of 10 stochastic simulations. The model predicts that cancer care disruptions during the COVID‐19 pandemic could lead to 21 247 (2.0%) more cancer deaths in Canada in 2020 to 2030, assuming treatment capacity is recovered to 2019 prepandemic levels in 2021. This represents 355 172 life years lost expected due to pandemic‐related diagnostic and treatment delays. The largest number of expected excess cancer deaths was predicted for breast, lung and colorectal cancers, and in the provinces of Ontario, Québec and British Columbia. Diagnostic and treatment capacity in 2021 onward highly influenced the number of cancer deaths over the next decade. Cancer care disruptions during the COVID‐19 pandemic could lead to significant life loss; however, most of these could be mitigated by increasing diagnostic and treatment capacity in the short‐term to address the service backlog. |
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| Bibliography: | ObjectType-Article-1 SourceType-Scholarly Journals-1 ObjectType-Feature-2 content type line 14 content type line 23 Members of “McGill Task Force on the Impact of COVID‐19 on Cancer Control and Care” are listed in the Appendix. Funding informationThis work was supported by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (operating grant VR5‐172666 and foundation grant 143347 to Eduardo L. Franco). The model simulations were run using the supercomputer Béluga from École de technologie supérieure, managed by Calcul Québec (www.calculquebec.ca/) and Compute Canada (www.computecanada.ca). The operation of this supercomputer is funded by the Canada Foundation for Innovation (CFI), Ministère de l'Économie, des Sciences et de l'Innovation du Québec (MESI) and the Fonds de recherche du Québec ‐ Nature et technologies (FRQ‐NT). The companion web application was developed with in‐kind support from the Canadian Partnership Against Cancer. The funders played no role in the writing of the manuscript, the collection/analysis of the data or the decision to submit it for publication. The corresponding author had full access to all the data in the study and had final responsibility for the decision to submit for publication. |
| ISSN: | 0020-7136 1097-0215 1097-0215 |
| DOI: | 10.1002/ijc.33884 |