Who is BBC’s Jeremy Bowen and what has he said about his bowel cancer diagnosis?
JEREMY Bowen is a well known face on the news, thanks to his career as a BBC journalist.
In April 2019 he revealed that he has been diagnosed with bowel cancer - we take a look at his life in the spotlight.
Who is Jeremy Bowen?
Jeremy, 59, was born February 6, 1960, and is a Welsh journalist and television presenter.
He has been the BBC's Middle East Editor since 2005 after beginning his career with the broadcaster in 1984.
He has travelled to more than 70 countries as a war correspondent and was robbed at gunpoint while reporting from Kosovo during the 1999 Bosnian War.
He has a son and a daughter with his partner Julia Williams.
What has Jeremy said about his bowel cancer diagnosis?
On April 1, 2019, Jeremy revealed that he is battling bowel cancer - despite showing no common symptoms of the disease.
He is undergoing treatment after having surgery to remove a tumour.
Jeremy revealed the diagnosis on BBC Breakfast as he urged people not to "die of embarrassment" over getting tested.
He said: "I had funny pains in my legs and my back when I was in Iraq last May.
"I went to hospital for a couple of days but they didn't say it was cancer, they said it was scar tissue from a previous operation.
"I had no symptoms but thought I should get a test, it came back positive.
"I had a colonoscopy, when they put a camera on a stick up your bottom - it's not nearly as bad as it sounds, and they give you lots of drugs - from that they found a tumour.
"I had an operation to take it away and now I'm going through chemotherapy.
"It's not the thing you choose but I'm confident that I'm getting very good medical treatment and I'll be OK."
MORE ON BOWEL CANCER
Can bowel cancer be treated?
Bowel cancer is the second deadliest form of the disease in the UK, claiming 16,000 lives every year. But it can be cured, if it's caught early enough.
Catch it at stage 1 - the earliest stage - and you have a 97 per cent chance of surviving five years or longer.
But catch it at stage 4, when it has already spread, and that chance plummets to just seven per cent.
That's why The Sun launched the No Time 2 Lose campaign last year, to urge everyone to learn the signs of bowel cancer - spearheaded by Sun columnist and stage 4 bowel cancer patient, Deborah James.
We also called for the screening age to be lowered from 60 to 50 - a move that could save up to 4,500 lives every year.