New study suggests cancer patients at high risk of COVID-19 fatality

A new study in the US has established that the mortality rate among cancer patients infected with COVID-19 is higher. The study, conducted by researchers and physicians at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine and Montefiore Health System, suggests that active cancer patients are more likely to die from coronavirus infection, than those without cancer. The study was recently published in the online edition of Cancer Discovery.

The study involved a total of 218 cancer patients who tested positive for COVID-19 between March 18-April 8, 2020 at Montefiore Medical Center, New York. Out of them, 61 patients died from COVID-19. The fatality rate at this was recorded to be 28 per cent, as compared to the overall mortality rate of 5.8 per cent for COVID-19 in the United States.

The patients were treated at a time when COVID-19 testing was mostly done in symptomatic patients who needed immediate hospitalisation. The study stated that the phenomenon may partially explain the high fatality rate within the study’s cancer population.

However, even when compared to mortality rates in the non-cancer patients across New York in the same time period, cancer patients posed a significantly higher risk of dying due to coronavirus.

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According to the study, cancer patients are at a higher risk due to the underlying malignancy, increased comorbidities or, treatment-related immunosuppression. The data suggests that there is a need for proactive strategies to reduce the likelihood of infection and to improve an early identification of COVID-19 among vulnerable cancer patients. 35,85,711 people have been detected with COVID-19 across the world, while 2,48, 771 patients have succumbed to the infection.