Former US president Joe Biden has revealed he is suffering from an ‘aggressive’ form of prostate cancer. The 82-year-old has also faced countless heartbreaks over the decades – including several family deaths
Joe Biden’s ‘aggressive’ form of prostate cancer is the latest in a series of tough challenges for the former US president.
The 82-year-old politician was recently diagnosed with the disease after doctors found a “prostate nodule” during an examination. Mr Biden had been for a check-up after experiencing “urinary symptoms”, his office said in a statement.
The Grade Group 5 advanced cancer has already spread to his bones, but doctors feel hopeful there can be an “effective management” of the disease’s progression because it appears to be “hormone-sensitive”.
Dr Alan Tan, genitourinary section lead at Vanderbilt University Medical Center in Nashville – who is not treating the ex-president – said Biden has a “very good chance of still getting into remission” in as little as six months with effective therapy treatment, adding: “This is the most common thing I see in my clinic. This is bread and butter genitourinary oncology.”
The Biden family may be left reeling by the latest news, but this is by far not the worst thing they’ve ever faced.
Joe previously lost his first wife and their toddler daughter in a horror car crash in 1972, just six weeks after he was elected to the Senate.
Neilia Hunter Biden, a teacher, had been driving their three young children down a rural road in Delaware. In the back were sons Beau, aged three, and Hunter, aged two, as well as 18-month-old daughter Naomi, who they nicknamed Amy.
As she reached a T-junction, Neilia began edging out onto the main road. But while her head was turned one way, a tractor-trailer driven by Curtis C. Dunn ploughed straight ahead and Neilia pulled out straight into his path.
The truck had no time to swerve the family’s car and hit Neilia broadside as she drove into its path. She and little Amy were pronounced dead on arrival at the Wilmington General Hospital, while Beau suffered a broken leg and other wounds, and Hunter was treated for a skull fracture and severe traumatic brain damage.
The boys were kept in hospital for the next few months, and Joe was sworn into the Senate from their bedside. His wife and daughter were buried together at a churchyard cemetery in Greenville.
The truck driver was never charged in the crash, but for years was dogged by rumours he had been drunk at the time of the accident. Joe Biden himself made pointed comments about alcohol being involved, including as recently as 2007 when he said Dunn “allegedly … drank his lunch”.
An investigation by Judge Jerome Herlihy found there was “no indication that the truck driver had been drinking”, and in 2007 a spokesman for Biden said the politician “fully accepts the Dunn family’s word that these rumours were false”.
Dunn died in 1999, but his daughter Pam Hamill said her father had suffered throughout his life over the deaths of Neilia and Amy.
“He grieved over that,” she said. “He was haunted and was tormented by that for years.”
Joe and Neilia had met in the Bahamas on spring break in 1964, and Joe was smitten. The budding politician even told her during that trip that they would get married – and indeed they did, just two years later.
“Basically I fell ass over tin cup in love – at first sight. She was so easy to talk to,” he wrote in his 2007 memoir Promises to Keep. “That was her special touch, the way she made everyone feel okay about themselves. Nobody ever felt smaller around Neilia.”
When teacher Neilia helped Joe unseat his rival and win his first seat at the Senate, she was described by media as the “brains” of his campaign.
Her death, along with little Amy, was devastating for Joe and his surviving boys. In 2015 he commemorated his first wife’s memory in a speech to Yale University, saying: “The incredible bond I have with my children is the gift I’m not sure I would have had, had I not been through what I went through [after the fatal crash]. But by focusing on my sons, I found my redemption.”
Beau and Hunter had to grow up without their mother or sister, and encouraged their father to re-marry, welcoming their stepmother Jill Biden when Joe married her in 1977. Beau went on to marry Hallie Olivere and honoured his late sister when his own daughter was born, naming her Natalie Naomi.
Tragically, Beau developed ill health after serving in the US military in Kosovo. He was diagnosed with ankylosing spondylitis, an inflammatory disease of the spine which causes the vertebrae bones to fuse together.
Beau also developed brain cancer and lived with a tumour inside his head for the final years of his life. His father Joe suggested it was linked to Beau’s exposure to military burn pits in Iraq. Beau’s symptoms included a headache, numbness and paralysis, and doctors said he had suffered a minor stroke.
Three years later in 2013, he was diagnosed with glioblastoma multiforme, the most aggressive form of primary brain cancer. Brain surgeons removed a lesion and Beau underwent radiation and chemotherapy to stabilise the progression of the disease.
Sadly, in May 2015, the father of two was admitted to hospital again as the cancer had reappeared in his brain. Just 10 days later he died at the age of 46, and his funeral was held the following week. It was attended by Barack and Michelle Obama, as well as Bill and Hillary Clinton, and Mr Obama described Beau as “an original. He was a good man. He did in 46 years what most of us couldn’t do in 146”.
Poignantly, Joe had arranged for Chris Martin, the lead singer of Beau’s favourite band Coldplay, to sing at his funeral. Chris performed a solo version of Til Kingdom Come for the emotional guests.
Since his death, Joe and Jill have been ardent campaigners for better cancer care and prevention, and both of them have previously had skin cancers removed.
In 2023, both the then-president and the First Lady underwent minor operations to remove cancerous skin lesions. Joe’s, a basal cell carcinoma, was taken from his chest, and his doctor said they would continue to monitor his skin for further abnormalities.
Joe had several non-melanoma skin cancers removed in the past, before his presidency. Jill also had three lesions removed, two of which tested positive for basal cell carcinoma.
Just last year, Joe was forced to step down as the Democrat candidate for presidency over fears for his cognitive health. His decision led the way for Kamala Harris to win the candidacy – but she lost to convicted criminal Donald Trump when he successfully won his second term.
