Morning Co-Anchor Prepares for Surgery, Treatment
“Good Morning America” co-anchor Robin Roberts announced on the ABC-TV show Tuesday that she has breast cancer and will undergo surgery on Friday.
“As we said, we consider all of you family and friends,” co-anchor Diane Sawyer told viewers.
Roberts said, “We do.”
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Sawyer: “And we know that you really are. So there is something we want to share with you about something we’ve learned inside our family this week.”
Roberts: “Because we wanted you to hear from us. Didn’t want you to hear it anywhere else. [I’ve] now been able to say it out loud. I have breast cancer, as my family here knows and my family at home knows. I’m very blessed and thankful that I found it early and detected it. Ironically, the day that we did the tribute show for our dear friend, Joel Siegel. And I happened to do a piece on the show about his courageous battle and how early detection is key. That very night, I found a lump. Normally, I would have not done anything because I’m healthy, right?”
Sawyer: “Healthy? You are the model for all of us.”
On the ABC News Web site, Roberts wrote:
” . . . . I will be having surgery shortly and follow-up treatment in the months to come. So in the coming months, you will probably notice that I will have my good days and my bad days, but I know I will get through it with the love and support of my family and friends. Diane, Sam, Chris and all of the folks behind the scenes who make this program come to life each and every morning have been so supportive and loving at this challenging time.” The references were to on-air colleagues Sawyer, Chris Cuomo and weatherman Sam Champion, and to Siegel, the show’s longtime movie critic and entertainment editor who died of cancer on June 29.
Roberts, 46, made the announcement at 7:35 a.m. She added on the Web site, “I can’t stress enough how important it is to get screened and checked for all cancers and to do self breast exams. I am so blessed that I found this in the early stages and the prognosis is so promising that my doctor expects me to be flying planes and hanging on to submarines in the middle of the Atlantic and scaling the Mayan Pyramids in no time in the mornings to come.”
By 9:30 a.m., more than 900 messages were on the ABC News Web site wishing her well.
“Dear Robin, Morning television causes us to feel like we are friends even though we have never met. Your candor and warmth radiates! Thank you for being YOU. You will be in my thoughts and prayers as you go through your treatments. You are an inspiration to all of us. All the best to you!!!” said one.
“We are your family and we love you. A viewer,” said another.
According to her bio, Roberts was named third anchor of “Good Morning America” in May 2005.
She had been a contributor to the show since June 1995, and has worked in broadcasting for more than 20 years. Other ABC assignments have included segments hosting “Good Morning America Sunday” and “Prime Time.”
“From 1990 to 2005, Roberts was also a contributor to ESPN, where she was one of the network’s most versatile commentators. Her assignments there included hosting ‘SportsCenter,’ contributing to ‘NFL PrimeTime’ from 1990-1994, and providing reports and interviews from the field,” the bio said.
It was just in April that “Good Morning America” heard the story of former morning co-anchor Rene Syler, who underwent a preventive double mastectomy. Syler was co-anchor of “The Early Show” on CBS until December. “She was working on a first-person piece about her forthcoming surgery when she was told that the Early Show ‘was going in a different direction. It wasn’t like there was any room for debate,’ she says,” Gail Shister wrote then in the Philadelphia Inquirer.
