Yes, cancer rates are increased during COVID-19 but this occurs due to risk factors as sedentary lifestyles, consumption of highly processed foods, obesity, Type 2 diabetes, and alcohol consumption so, the annual number of cancer deaths increased 4.7% and the number with cancer as the underlying cause increased 1.0% from 2018 to 2021.
But, after the onset of COVID-19, there was 46.4% decline in average in the number of newly diagnosed cases of breast, colorectal, oesophageal, gastric, lung, and pancreatic cancers. This occurs due to low rate of patients who went to get tested during pandemic.