Former U.S. President Joe Biden has been diagnosed with prostate cancer, his office said Sunday.
Last week, doctors saw Biden after urination symptoms and found a prostate nodule. On Friday, he was diagnosed with prostate cancer, and cancer cells spread to his bones.
“While this represents a more aggressive form of the disease, cancer appears to be hormone-sensitive and can be managed effectively,” his office said.
“The president and his family are working with doctors to review treatment options.”
The score for prostate cancer is called the Gleason score, which measures the appearance of cancer cells compared to normal cells in a ratio of 1 to 10. Biden's score is 9, indicating that his cancer is one of the most aggressive.
A group of cancer experts say Canada's national screening guidelines have expired, which has led to people being diagnosed later, which makes them more difficult to treat.
When current state cancer spreads to other parts of the body, it usually spreads to the bones. Metastatic cancer is harder to treat than local cancers, because drugs can be difficult to reach all tumors and fully rooted in the disease.
But when current state cancers require hormone growth, just like Biden’s case, they may be susceptible to treatment of hormone deprivation tumors.
U.S. President Donald Trump, a longtime political rival, posted on social media that he was sad about the news, “We hope Joe will recover quickly and successfully.”
Biden’s vice president Kamala Harris said on social media that she left him in the “heart and prayer of this time” of her family.
“Joe is a warrior – I know he will face this challenge with the same strength, resilience and optimism that has always defined his life and leadership.”
Biden's health is the focus of exercise
Biden's health, 82, was a major concern for voters during his presidency. Biden gave up his second semester bid while seeking reelection after a disastrous debate performance in June 2024. Harris became the Democratic nominee and lost to Trump, who returned to the White House after four years of vacation.
But in recent days, Biden has rejected concerns about his age, despite reporting in his new book original sin Aides written by Jake Tapper and Alex Thompson protect the public from the decline of the presidency.
In February 2023, Biden cleared skin lesions from his chest, a basal cell carcinoma, a common form of skin cancer. In November 2021, he escaped from his colon, a benign but potentially cancerous lesion.
In 2022, Biden became one of the priorities of the “cancer satellite” with the goal of halving the cancer mortality rate over the next 25 years. The initiative is a continuation of his work as vice president, who solved a disease that troubled his eldest son, Beau, who died of brain cancer in 2015.
Biden said in announcing his goal to cut cancer mortality in the country in half that it could be “the moment when the United States proves itself and, frankly, we can do real big things.”
