Cancer backlog: Action Radiotherapy response

Action Radiotherapy calls for an urgent resolution to the cancer backlog caused by the Covid-19 pandemic.

“A dramatic intervention from Government and the NHS is needed to prevent thousands of lives being unnecessarily lost to the cancer backlog resulting from the Covid response”, Chair of Action Radiotherapy Professor Pat Price says following BBC Breakfast TV appearance.

Chair of Action Radiotherapy, founder of Radiotherapy4Life and advisor to the All-Party Parliamentary Group for Radiotherapy (APPG RT), Professor Pat Price has called for an urgent plan to tackle the shocking cancer crisis featured in BBC Panorama’s investigation airing tonight. 

Following her appearance on BBC Breakfast TV this morning Professor Pat Price who features in the Panorama programme said:

“We need a dramatic intervention from Government if we are to avoid a national tragedy.  It is widely accepted by experts across the field that as many people will die to cancer unnecessarily as we have lost to the Covid virus itself unless we act now; this has been clear from the moment we went into lockdown.   This morning, the NHS, despites months or warning, seem to still be burying their collective heads in the sand about whether or not there is an imminent crisis in cancer care post Covid.  Believe me, there is!  And it appears they are limiting their aspiration to tackle it by working to have the cancer service back to normal by the end of the year.  This is simply not good enough.  It risks a scandal and will have a devastating impact on patients; a second tragedy after the Covid tragedy. Our efforts to fight this cancer backlog need to match those employed against the pandemic itself in focus, energy,  commitment and speed. Radiotherapy must to be at the heart of those efforts as it can safely be used during the covid crisis  and can be a substitute for surgery.  For years it’s been underfunded and starved of the priority and resources that it needs.  Radiotherapy desperately requires urgent investment now in the form of more advanced IT and technology, replacing out of date equipment  and it needs to be set free from the dead hand of bureaucracy that has held it back for so long.”

“The APPG RT have a 6 point plan to transform the radiotherapy service, rapidly make up years of underinvestment and most importantly deliver world class cancer services. Here we have a solution. We cannot wait to act. Our cancer patients must be the priority. “

The APPG RT full 6 point plan can be accessed here: https://www.appgrt.co.uk/publications