RBG Has Quietly Been Treated For Cancer
Ruth Bader Ginsburg was recently treated for cancer for a fourth time Image by Getty Images
Associate Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg has undergone radiation treatment for a cancerous tumor located on her pancreas, a representative for the Supreme Court said on Friday.
The 86-year-old justice has previously survived colon, pancreatic and lung cancer. On August 5, she began three weeks of outpatient radiation treatment at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York. According to a report first published by NPR’s Nina Totenberg, doctors at Sloan Kettering said that “The tumor was treated definitively and there is no evidence of disease elsewhere in the body.”
“Justice Ginsburg will continue to have periodic blood tests and scans,” the court added. “No further treatment is needed at this time.” Though Ginsburg was forced to cancel her annual summer vacation in New Mexico, she managed to catch a showing of the National Yiddish Theatre Folksbiene’s production of “Fiddler on the Roof” in Manhattan during her treatment last week.
Just a month ago, Ginsburg spoke openly about public concerns about her health and wellbeing in a memorable interview with NPR, sharing an anecdote that illustrated the futility of other people’s comments on her health.
“There was a senator, I think it was after my pancreatic cancer, who announced with great glee that I was going to be dead within six months,” she told Totenberg. “That senator, whose name I have forgotten, is now himself dead, and I am very much alive.”
Jenny Singer is the deputy life/features editor for the Forward. You can reach her at [email protected] or on Twitter @jeanvaljenny
This is a moment of great uncertainty. Here’s what you can do about it.
We hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, we’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s independent Jewish news this Passover. All donations are being matched by the Forward Board - up to $100,000.
This is a moment of great uncertainty for the news media, for the Jewish people, and for our sacred democracy. It is a time of confusion and declining trust in public institutions. An era in which we need humans to report facts, conduct investigations that hold power to account, tell stories that matter and share honest discourse on all that divides us.
With no paywall or subscriptions, the Forward is entirely supported by readers like you. Every dollar you give this Passover is invested in the future of the Forward — and telling the American Jewish story fully and fairly.
The Forward doesn’t rely on funding from institutions like governments or your local Jewish federation. There are thousands of readers like you who give us $18 or $36 or $100 each month or year.
Support our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
