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Cancer: Surgery

Question for Department of Health and Social Care

UIN 154776, tabled on 19 February 2021

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what plans his Department has to reschedule cancer operations that have been cancelled during the covid-19 crisis outbreak.

Answered on

1 March 2021

One of the key priorities outlined in the third phase of the National Health Service response to COVID-19 is to reduce the number of patients who have waited longer than 62 days from urgent referral to starting cancer treatment.

Action to reduce long waits includes expanding the capacity of COVID-19 secure cancer hubs, prioritising people for surgery centrally on the basis of clinical need and drawing on the independent sector to increase capacity.