She said doctors have decided not to treat it as the side effects outweigh the benefits
Dame Esther Rantzen has been struck by a second form of cancer. The 85-year-old television presenter was told she had stage four lung cancer in 2023 and has now disclosed that she has recently been hit by another type of the disease, though her medical team has chosen not to provide treatment for it.
In her column for The Times, she wrote: “And a further diagnosis, comparatively recently, has revealed that I am also being attacked by a completely different kind of cancer, which needed treatment with chemotherapy and being zapped with radiotherapy. I’m not sure exactly what it is. But it is quite annoying to have two different kinds of cancer simultaneously.
“I am not receiving any treatment at all”… as “the side-effects outweigh the benefits”.
She continued: “So the cancers are progressing but, according to my most recent scan, very slowly.”
The veteran broadcaster has previously shared her hope of being reunited with her deceased husband Desmond Wilcox following her own passing.
She told The Times: “If there is a heaven, it would be a very happy place. It’s a lovely idea to meet Desmond again and all those I have loved and lost – my parents and grandparents, my close friends and family.”
Esther was wed to Desmond – who fathered her three children – for over two decades before losing him in 2000 when he passed away at 69 following a heart attack. The television personality had previously confessed her yearning to see her spouse once more.
During her stint on ‘Piers Morgan’s Life Stories’, Esther shared with the presenter: “Desmond’s last words to me were: ‘I adore you’. I was sitting on his deathbed.
“I will take those words with me to the grave. I said to my son last night: ‘If God gave me the choice between 10 more years of life and 10 more minutes with Desi, I would pick those 10 minutes’.”
