Understanding the impact of COVID incancer patients through the COVID-19 and Cancer (CCC-19) and other COVID consortiums

SARS-CoV-2 and the resulting disease, COVID-19, has led to a global pandemic with broad impact on the deliveryof medical care Cancer patients may be especially vulnerable to both infection and adverse outcomes from COVIDdue to a number of factors including advanced age, immunosuppression from disease and/or anticancer therapy, and heightened interaction with the medical system Several cohort studies have been launched to more fullyunderstand risk factors for death and other adverse outcomes in patients with active or remote cancer CCC-19 is acohort study involving more than 100 institutions that enter data into a REDCaP database regarding patientdemographics, cancer type and treatment details, and outcome of COVID infection All patients have documentedSARS-CoV-2 PCR positive and/or clinical symptoms consistent with COVID, in addition to an ongoing or past historyof invasive malignancy The initial analysis of this cohort study (n=928;Kuderer et al , Lancet 2020) demonstrated a13% mortality rate and revealed several factors associated with an increased mortality including advanced age, male gender, greater number of comorbidities, worse ECOG performance status, and progressive cancer Recentcancer surgery and receipt of cytotoxic or other systemic anticancer therapy was not associated with worseoutcome, although small patient numbers in some subsets precluded definitive conclusions At present, there areapproximately 3,000 patients entered into this database and updated analyses will be presented In addition to thiseffort, a number of other societies have created similar databases including ASH, ASCO, and ESMO Thesecomplementary efforts will allow a global assessment of the impact of COVID on cancer patients including mortalityand adverse outcomes in addition to cancer-specific outcomes Last, the NCI COVID-19 in Cancer Patients Study(NCCAPS) is a prospective study in patients with active cancer and recent SARS-CoV-2 infection This 2,000-patient study is open to accrual and will prospectively define both the impact of COVID on cancer and also cancerstatus and treatment on COVID outcome In addition, biospecimen collection in this study will examine geneticpredisposition, cytokine and coagulopathic parameters, and serologic outcomes Collectively, these retrospectiveand prospective efforts will enable a more granular understanding of COVID in cancer patients to enable bothappropriate cancer care delivery and improvement in outcomes in cancer patients with COVID infection