Ethan Zohn

Ethan Zohn

Ethan Zohn on itchy skin, two stem cell transplants, and getting back to the game

Ethan Zohn won Survivor: Africa in the early 2000s. In 2009 he was 35, a former professional footballer, training for the New York City marathon, when he was diagnosed with lymphoma. What he noticed first was not a lump. He was exercising every day and his skin was intensely itchy. It was around four months after that itch began that a swollen lymph node appeared in his neck, and scans found a mass in his chest measuring six centimetres by twelve. He had lost his own father to colorectal cancer when he was fourteen. He has said doctors could not tell him why he, or so many others, developed lymphoma. His treatment ran to several rounds of chemotherapy, twenty-two rounds of radiotherapy and a stem cell transplant. Twenty months later, the cancer came back. What he credits for the remission that followed is a targeted therapy that had newly become available, together with a second stem cell transplant — this time using stem cells donated by his brother. At the time of this interview he had been in remission for nine years, and had gone back to compete on Survivor: Winners at War. He has said that while he was ill he dreamed and prayed he would live long enough to play the game again. He now speaks publicly during Blood Cancer Awareness Month. Nothing here is medical advice. If you have a lump, itchy skin, night sweats or unexplained weight loss, the NHS advice is to see your GP.

• Hodgkin lymphoma