"I'm going to have to spend the rest of my life being treated"
BBC News presenter Maryam Moshiri revealed she is living with blood cancer after being diagnosed with the rare condition polycythaemia vera (PV).
The 49-year-old was diagnosed in November 2024 and said she wanted to speak publicly about her experience to raise awareness of the disease.
She told the BBC: “It’s been two years since my diagnosis and I’ve felt that I’ve started to understand the disease a lot better and the way it affects my life.
“I’ve got a handle on it to a degree now, so I felt it was really important to raise awareness.
“I’m going to have to spend the rest of my life being treated for this.”
PV is a rare and treatable blood cancer that causes the body to produce too many red blood cells. This can make the blood thicker than normal and increase the risk of blood clots.
These clots can lead to serious complications, including strokes, heart attacks and deep vein thrombosis (DVT). Symptoms can include headaches, confusion, dizziness and blurred vision.
Maryam continued: “I was told by my consultant that I have this incurable blood cancer.
“Mostly I had no symptoms and that’s one of the problems with this disease.
“The only reason mine was caught was because my GP was so fastidious in the way she did my routine blood tests and immediately sent them for further diagnosis.”
As part of her initial treatment, Maryam underwent several “debilitating” hour-long sessions of venesection, which involves inserting a needle into a vein in the arm to gradually remove blood. It can help reduce the thickness of the blood in people with PV.
She said: “In about a space of five months, I had venesection seven or eight times. So you can imagine my iron levels hit the floor and I felt even more exhausted.
“After a while, I started feeling extremely unwell and tired. I started losing my hair, I got itchy all over my body, but the main symptom was fatigue.”
Maryam Moshiri was later able to receive interferon, an immunotherapy treatment, through the NHS.
After adjustments to her treatment, she said she is now in a better position and has needed significantly fewer venesections.
The BBC presenter said her condition has changed her life, although she now feels “much better”.
She said the fatigue has sometimes prevented her from attending family occasions or playing with her three children.
She added: “It’s the kind of fatigue that is not like I’m just tired and I didn’t get a good night’s sleep; you feel like someone has removed your battery completely, and however much sleep you get makes no difference.
“Even though I feel the best I have in two years, I don’t know how I’m going to be in six months, one year, two years.
“People with PV have a higher chance of stroke, heart attack or DVT, so it’s something I always have be aware of and make sure I mitigate.”
PV cannot currently be cured, but it can be managed with treatment. In some cases, it can develop into another blood cancer called myelofibrosis.
More rarely, it can develop into acute myeloid leukaemia (AML), according to Blood Cancer UK, which funds research into blood cancers.
Despite the impact of her condition, Maryam Moshiri has continued working for the BBC and travelled internationally to cover major stories over the past two years.
Her work has included anchoring from Qatar during the US-Israel war with Iran, covering the selection of the new Pope from the Vatican and travelling to Greenland for Vice-President JD Vance’s visit.
Maryam said she has been supported by her husband Jonathan, BBC management and her children Iris, Vivienne and Caspian.
She added: “It took me a long time to be able to tell them about this illness, because I don’t want to worry them, but they have been so understanding.
“When I say things like, ‘Mummy is too tired to play with you’, they get it and they don’t push it.”
Helen Rowntree, chief executive of Blood Cancer UK, praised Maryam for speaking publicly about her diagnosis:
“We’re so grateful to Maryam for bravely sharing her story.
“When public figures speak openly about their diagnosis, it cuts through the silence that so often surrounds blood cancer – the UK’s fifth most common cancer and third biggest cancer killer.”
Maryam Moshiri said she remains hopeful that ongoing research could lead to further advances in blood cancer treatment:
“There is a lot of research going into blood cancer and scientific advancement to look forward to.
“Hopefully they’ll be some sort of advancement that will help even more than these medications I’ve been given.”
