Joe Biden diagnosed with aggressive prostate cancer
US President Joe Biden delivers remarks on the passing of former President Jimmy Carter at The Company House in Christiansted, St. Croix, US Virgin Islands on December 29, 2024. Former US president Joe Biden has been diagnosed with an “aggressive” form of prostate cancer and is reviewing treatment options, a statement from his office said on May 18, 2026. (Photo by SAUL LOEB / AFP)
WASHINGTON, United States — Former US president Joe Biden has been diagnosed with an “aggressive” form of prostate cancer that has spread to his bones, and is reviewing treatment options, a statement from his office said Sunday.
On Friday, the 82-year-old Democrat was diagnosed with cancer after he experienced increasing urinary symptoms and was seen for a new finding of a prostate nodule, the statement said.
“While this represents a more aggressive form of the disease, the cancer appears to be hormone-sensitive, which allows for effective management. The President and his family are reviewing treatment options with his physicians,” it continued.
US President Donald Trump, who has long derided Biden over his age—despite being just four years younger—and cognitive abilities, said he was “saddened” by the news.
“We extend our warmest and best wishes to Jill and the family, and we wish Joe a fast and successful recovery,” Republican Trump said on Truth Social of his political rival, referring to Biden’s wife, Jill Biden.
“Joe is a fighter,” Biden’s vice president, Kamala Harris, who stepped in as Democratic nominee in the battle against Trump after Biden dropped out of last year’s presidential election, said in a post on X.
“I know he will face this challenge with the same strength, resilience, and optimism that have always defined his life and leadership. We are hopeful for a full and speedy recovery,” she continued.
Prostate cancer is the most common form of cancer in men. Hormone therapy is a common treatment that can shrink tumors and slow cancer growth, but it is not a cure.
According to the statement, Biden’s cancer was found to have “a Gleason score of 9 (Grade Group 5).”
Prostate cancer that looks “very abnormal” is assigned the highest rating, Grade 5, according to the American Cancer Society. The Gleason Score often indicates the sum of the grades from the two areas in the prostate that make up most of the cancer, but can also be calculated other ways.
‘Watch me’
Biden left office in January this year as the oldest serving US president in history, and was dogged by questions over his health and age for much of his term.
READ: Joe Biden’s decline: Blaming him now is all wrong
For years, he had faced questions, including from Democratic voters, over whether he was too old—lacking in mental acuity or physical endurance—for a job as trying as the presidency.
His response to doubters was brisk: “Watch me.”
But in July 2024, he was forced to drop his reelection bid after a disastrous debate against Trump in which fears about his decline and cognitive abilities came surging to the fore.
Support for Harris surged, but she eventually lost to Trump.
Biden, who beat Trump at the polls in 2020, maintains that he could have won the 2024 election too, but questions have long swirled over the responses of staff and key Democrats to evident signs of his decline.
They have flared with the release, set for this Tuesday, of “Original Sin: President Biden’s Decline, Its Cover-Up, and His Disastrous Choice to Run Again” by CNN journalist Jake Tapper and Alex Thompson of Axios.
Last week, a newly published recording of Biden speaking hesitantly and struggling to remember key events and dates fueled renewed debate over his mental capabilities while still in office.
Biden’s life has been marked by personal tragedy. In 1972, his wife and baby daughter were killed in a car crash, days after he had been elected as a US senator at the age of 29.
Biden underwent surgery twice in 1988 for brain aneurysms. In 202,3 he had a skin lesion — a basal cell carcinoma — removed from his chest. He had previously had non-melanoma skin cancers removed.
Biden’s son Beau Biden died of brain cancer in 2015.
Under President Barack Obama, the United States launched a “cancer moonshot” bid to bring the disease under control. Obama tasked Biden, then his vice president, with leading the effort in the wake of Beau Biden’s death.
Trump’s administration cut cancer research funding by 31 percent in the first three months of 2025 compared to the same period last year, a Senate report showed earlier this month./mcm
