Half a million people have died from a Cancer the aftermath of the 2008 economic crisis. Massive unemployment and drastic cuts in health spending are believed to be the cause of this excess mortality from cancer. Patients would have been unable to follow treatment for lack of money and thereforeHealth care access.
The figures, revealed in the British magazine The Lancet, were observed over the period 2008-2010 on the basis of data from the World Bank and the World Health Organization.
In detail, 260,000 additional deaths from cancer were recorded in OECD countries (Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, editor’s note) between 2008 and 2010, including 160,000 within the European Union, according to the conclusions of the study.
“On a planetary scale, it is well more than 500,000 additional deaths from cancer during this period”, specifies the director of the study, Dr. Mahiben Maruthappude the Imperial College in London, quoted by AFP.
The impact of the economy on physical and mental health
The study shows that economic uncertainties can influence the health and even the survival of patients.
The rise in unemployment, by depriving patients of the financial means to treat themselves, had an indirect impact on cancer mortality: a 1% increase in unemployment was accompanied by an additional 0.37 deaths from cancer per 100,000 inhabitants. .
Spending cuts can also affect health: a 1% increase in health budget cuts has been associated with 0.0053 additional deaths.
This is not the first time that the 2008 economic crisis has been singled out for its human consequences. An Inserm study published in the Weekly Epidemiological Bulletin in 2015 had already concluded that this had led to an increase in suicides – 600 additional suicides – in France.
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