The latest figures suggest that nearly 1,500 medical operations have been cancelled at some of London’s leading hospitals in the four weeks following Qilin’s ransomware attack on pathology services provider Synnovis. But perhaps no one was more severely impacted than Johanna Groothuizen. Hanna, as she goes by, is now without her right breast after having her skin-sparing mastectomy and immediate breast reconstruction surgery swapped with a simple mastectomy at the last minute.
In late 2023, the 36-year-old research culture manager at King’s College London—a former health sciences researcher—was diagnosed with HER2-positive breast cancer. It’s an aggressive form that requires immediate medical attention as it spreads more quickly and recurs more often. After receiving her diagnosis, Hanna promptly began a course of chemotherapy until she was well enough to undergo what is hoped to be the first and only major surgery to cure the disease.
She had been informed repeatedly between then and the operation, which was set for June 7—four days after the ransomware attack—that the planned procedure was a skin-sparing mastectomy, allowing surgeons to reconstruct her right breast cosmetically right away.
This article has been indexed from CySecurity News – Latest Information Security and Hacking Incidents
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