To begin with, it was driven by diabetes, cardiac issues and a handful of other concerns — but recently the number of people dying from cancer is starting to increase considerably above what is expected. Will this continue? Nobody can say for sure, but I suspect it will for many years to come.
When I outlined the scale of the cancer crisis previously on Twitter, various voices took great pleasure in pointing out that cancer deaths weren't rising — I don't hear from them anymore. Indeed, many of the more vocal lockdown commentators are actively drawing attention to the problem now.
Cancer is slow, but it's relentless. An undiagnosed tumour won't cause severe complications in days or weeks. But if it's left untreated for a year or two then the odds of survival drop precipitously. I fear that those lockdown delays are now starting to bite.
NHS Digital states that in 2020 there were 288,753 new cancer diagnoses — that is 38,421 fewer than in 2019. Full statistics for 2021 aren't available yet, but it's fair to assume that it would be a similar number again. A recent report estimated that across Europe the number was a gargantuan one million fewer diagnoses — it really is scandalous. Yet no public outcry, no emergency press conferences, no outrageous scaremongering tactics. Why is that?
Proponents of harder and longer lockdowns will go to great lengths to deny the impact that lockdown and associated fear-based messaging had on these numbers. There is a concerted effort to whitewash the health consequences of relentless restrictions, but that stain is not easy to remove.
Those of us with clearer memories will recall the one overriding instruction we were all given — 'stay home'. And that's exactly what millions of seriously ill people did, regardless of the state of their own health. Just look at the excess death figures in private homes right from the start of the pandemic in March 2020 — sky-high every single week. Tens of thousands of people stayed and died at home. That's a sorry fact...<<<Read More>>>...