‘Jeopardy!’ Host Alex Trebek Updates Fans on His Health One Year After Cancer Diagnosis

By J. Kim Murphy

LOS ANGELES (Variety.com) – Beloved “Jeopardy!” host Alex Trebek has provided a hopeful update on his health, almost one year after announcing his stage 4 pancreatic cancer diagnosis.

In March 2019, Trebek shared a statement on social media acknowledging that his prognosis was “not very encouraging,” but vowing to fight to beat the odds.

On Wednesday, Trebek made a new announcement, sharing the challenges of his chemo treatments and expressing a gratitude for his loved ones’ support and a determination to continue fighting.

Since his diagnosis, Trebek has continued his regular hosting duties on “Jeopardy!”. In January, he hosted the primetime special event “The Greatest of All Time,” uniting the game show’s highest money winners to compete against one another.

Here is the transcript of Trebek’s full statement.

“Hi, everyone. If you’ve got a minute, I’d like to bring you up to date on my health situation. The one-year survival rate for stage 4 pancreatic cancer patients is 18%. I’m very happy to report I have just reached that marker.

Now I’d be lying if I said the journey has been an easy one. There were some good days but a lot of not-so-good days. I joked with friends that the cancer won’t kill me, the chemo treatments will. There were moments of great pain, days when certain bodily functions no longer functioned and sudden, massive attacks of great depression that made me wonder if it really was worth fighting on. But I brushed that aside quickly because that would have been a massive betrayal, a betrayal of my wife and soulmate, Jean, who has given her all to help me survive. It would have been a betrayal of other cancer patients who have looked to me as an inspiration, and a cheerleader of sorts, of the value of living and hope, and it would certainly would have been a betrayal of my faith in God and the millions of prayers that have been said on my behalf.

You know, my oncologist tried to cheer me up the other day. He said, ‘Alex, even though the two-year survival rate is only 7%,’ he was certain that one year from now, the two of us would be sitting in his office celebrating my second anniversary of survival. And you know something, if I, no, if we — because so many of us are involved in this same situation — if we take it just one day at a time, with a positive attitude, anything is possible. I’ll keep you posted.”