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KANSAS CITY, Kan. — Cancer patients are much more vulnerable to COVID-19, according to doctors at the University of Kansas Cancer Center.
KU doctors say national research that the health system has been participating in shows cancer patients who catch COVID-19 are more likely to die from the disease.
Doctors said many of these patients are older or smokers.
Smoking remains the leading cause of cancer and doctors say if we can lower the smoking rate, we can reduce the number of people who develop cancer.
“We estimate there were more than 9 million cancer screenings missed in 2020, the first year of pandemic,” Dr. Ronald Chen, KU Medical Center’s chair of radiation oncology, said. “More than 9 million cancer screenings missed. I think that’s a very strong message. It tells us we are behind, we need to catch up.”
Doctors say they are still struggling to try to understand why for some people, COVID is nothing more than a bad cold, while others end up on a ventilator in intensive care and die from the disease.
Doctors say diabetes, hypertension and cardiovascular disease does make people more susceptible to COVID.
KU doctors are urging people to return to health care providers to resume preventative screenings that could save their lives.
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