Former X Factor judge Louis Walsh has revealed that he was diagnosed with a “rare” blood cancer.
During a conversation on the reality TV show Celebrity Big Brother, Walsh told former Love Island winner Ekin-Su Culculoglu and Dragons’ Den star Levi Roots that no one knew he had been sick.
On Friday’s show, he said he had been “shocked” to learn he had Waldenstrom’s Macroglobulinemia, a slow-growing and rare type of non-Hodgkin lymphoma that hits the white blood cells.
Describing how he spent his lockdown during coronavirus, Walsh said: “I was sick, and I think nobody knew I was sick.”
Culculoglu asked if he had Covid-19, and Walsh responded: “No, I had cancer – a mild version, a Waldenstrom, a rare one.”
Roots asked: “Which part? Pancreatic cancer?”
Walsh replied: “In my blood, I didn’t even know that I had it until I went to the hospital, and they checked me, checked me, checked me, then they found it.
“They said it’s a rare one.”
He told the celebrities it affected him mentally.
Gesturing to his head, he said: “It’s just up here. Even when I go past a hospital, I almost get sick.
“It’s all gone, I’m fine. It was just the shock of being sick and that word – nobody wants that word.
“I have it blocked out. It’s just a reality check. You see so many people sick and it’s terrible.
“In my world, it was all about pop music and all that. I didn’t think of anybody getting sick or anything like that, and that was like wow, reality check, you’re in the real world.”
The series continues on Virgin Media One and ITV.
Source: Press Association
