Veteran BBC News anchor Maryam Moshiri has revealed that she’s been diagnosed with an incurable blood cancer.
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In a recent interview with The Times of London, the 49-year-old explained that she had been living with polycythaemia vera, a rare but treatable blood cancer, for the past two years.
The news anchor explained that she was diagnosed back in November 2024 after a routine blood test to help monitor menopause.
“When you hit your forties, it’s this middle-age time where your parents are old, your kids are young, you’re perimenopausal. Then suddenly you’re hit with this irritating blood cancer. It’s a lot,” the mother of three told The Times.
Polycythaemia vera causes the bone marrow to produce too many red blood cells. This causes the blood to be too thick. Untreated, this can lead to a host of health problems like blood clots, which can lead to heart attacks and strokes.
Moshiri’s treatment includes venesection, which means blood is extracted twice a month in an effort to reduce red blood cells.
However, the cancer is incurable.
“It is going to be there till the day I die,” she told The Times. “A big part of this disease is having to get on with life.”
News Anchor Maryam Moshiri Has No Plans to Slow Down After Cancer Diagnosis: ‘I Love What I Do’
Though the treatments leave her exhausted, the news anchor, who has been with the BBC since 2003, has no plans to slow down.
“I love what I do; I love being where the story is,” she told the outlet. “I don’t want to allow blood cancer to stop me from doing my work.”
Meanwhile, she added that her BBC bosses and colleagues have been understanding about her ongoing cancer treatments.
“It’s an amazing job,” she gushed. “I’m very lucky to do it, but it can be physically very gruelling. When you do a job that you love, you don’t really feel like you’re working. As a child, I dreamt of being a TV news presenter. That was my dream job, and now I’m doing it.”
Of course, she admits living with cancer has grueling moments. She knows the rest of her life will involve many “hospital appointments and loads of medication.”
“That is better than dying, obviously, of a horrible cancer,” she added. “But it’s something that you have to get your head around. That’s the really sad thing about these types of blood cancers. You just have to live with them for years and years and years and years, and that takes its toll.”