Cancer Incidence Rates Did Not Rebound After COVID-19 Pandemic, Study Says

According to a study led by researchers at the NIH, “cancer incidence trends in 2021 largely returned to what they were before the COVID-19 pandemic,” but there was “little evidence of a rebound in incidence that would account for the decline in diagnoses in 2020, when screening and other medical care was disrupted.”

A previous study had shown that “new cancer diagnoses fell abruptly in early 2020, as did the volume of pathology reports, suggesting that many cancers were not being diagnosed in a timely manner.” A full recovery in cancer incidence “should appear as an increase over pre-pandemic levels (also known as a rebound) to account for the missed diagnoses.”

When researchers looked at cancer rates overall, they found that “incidence rates overall and for most specific cancers approached pre-pandemic levels, with no significant rebound to account for the 2020 decline. However, in addition to an uptick in new diagnoses of advanced breast cancer in 2021, the data also provided some evidence of an increase in diagnoses of advanced pancreatic cancer. Also, new diagnoses of thyroid cancers in 2021 were still below pre-pandemic levels.”