NEED TO KNOW
- Former President Joe Biden has been diagnosed with “aggressive” prostate cancer, his personal office announced on Sunday, May 18
- In a statement, his office said he was diagnosed with grade group 5 prostate cancer “with metastasis to the bone” on Friday, May 16
- “The President and his family are reviewing treatment options with his physicians,” the statement said
Former President Joe Biden has been diagnosed with “aggressive” prostate cancer.
On Sunday, May 18, Biden’s personal office announced in a statement that he was diagnosed with the disease after seeing a doctor last week. He is 82 years old.
“Last week, President Joe Biden was seen for a new finding of a prostate nodule after experiencing increasing urinary symptoms,” the statement said.
Mandel Ngan/AFP/Bloomberg via Getty
“On Friday, he was diagnosed with prostate cancer, characterized by a Gleason score of 9 (Grade Group 5) with metastasis to the bone,” the statement continued. “While this represents a more aggressive form of the disease, the cancer appears to be hormone-sensitive which allows for effective management. The President and his family are reviewing treatment options with his physicians.”
Wall Street Journal reporter Ken Thomas was the first to report the news.
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According to the American Cancer Society, a prostate cancer’s grade group is a measure of how likely the cancer is to grow and spread quickly. Grade group 5 means that “the cancer might or might not be growing outside the prostate and into nearby tissues. It has not spread to nearby lymph nodes or elsewhere in the body,” per the Cancer Society.
A spokesperson for the former president last shared an update on his health in a statement to ABC News on Tuesday, May 13.
“In a routine physical exam a small nodule was found in the prostate which necessitated further evaluation,” the spokesperson said at the time.
Biden’s health has been widely discussed in recent years. In February 2024, his doctor shared that he reportedly showed no signs of trouble at his annual 2024 physical exam.
“He continues to be fit for duty and fully executes all of his responsibilities without any exemptions or accommodations,” Dr. Kevin O’Connor wrote in a February 2024 letter, which was approved by physicians in the White House Medical Unit.
In February 2023, O’Connor called Biden a “healthy” and “vigorous 80-year-old” after the yearly exam, adding that he “remains fit for duty.”
The physician used similar language in a debrief after Biden’s November 2021 visit, when the president also underwent a routine colonoscopy.
Additionally, in 2023, the former president had a biopsy for a small lesion on his chest, and O’Connor determined two weeks later that it was cancerous.
“As expected, the biopsy confirmed that the small lesion was basal cell carcinoma. All cancerous tissue was successfully removed,” O’Connor wrote.
