STOP cancelling treatments!

An older man has passed away from lung cancer as he couldn’t be given proper treatment due to COVID-19.

Malachy Watkins was 73 years of age and had lung cancer. He was due to have treatment in March but it was postponed due to the coronavirus. He was unable to visit the hospital and receive his cure. Watkins was seen as too much of a risk to be entering a coronavirus infected area. His wife, Sheila, 71 was absolutely heart-broken as they thought he had a while longer

Malachy Watkins had previously had treatment to shrink the size of his tumours, which worked. Every three months before the world pandemic he had to go for monthly check-ups. His cancer had returned in February, the doctors decided to delay the treatment in an attempt to keep his safe from the virus.

This year cases like this have happened quite often. People with life-threatening diseases are not being thought of. Therefore people end up in critical positions and in this case the neglect led to death. Of course, his wife and family knew there was no cure for his aggressive cancer. Although, they had expected at least a few more years of loving and appreciating the family man.

The long-awaited treatment he was supposed to have received in March didn’t take place until May when he became very unwell. He was aching all over, and ended up with a collapsed lung. He received chemotherapy and immunotherapy but his weakened body could not handle the harsh treatments.

The visits for his wife and children were very minimal as they had to abide by the COVID-19 rules. He kept getting worse, and fell extremely ill in September, along with losing his voice. The NHS are missing cases like this one, cancer cases, serious kidney diseases and so on all to try and diminish the spreading and numbers of coronavirus.

If all treatments had continued through coronavirus, it could possibly be that many people would not have lost their battle with their illness. However, the doctors can only go through with the patient’s treatment so long as COVID-19 is balanced, and the NHS have some sort of control over it.

Over 2 million people in the UK had their cancer screening, treatments and more cancelled, as those patients were high risk of catching the virus.

Thank you for reading this article, “STOP cancelling treatments!. For more up-to-date news from around the world.

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Written by

Kaela

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