Sir Chris Hoy has said he is "not going to give up" in his battle with stage four prostate cancer, urging men to check their risk of the disease nearly three years on from his own diagnosis.
The six-time Olympic cycling champion was diagnosed with cancer in September 2023 and later announced that his condition was terminal, after a scan found primary cancer in his prostate which had spread to his bones, including his shoulder, pelvis, ribs and spine.
Doctors told Hoy that he had between just two and four years left to live, with his wife Sarra being diagnosed with an aggressive form of multiple sclerosis (MS) around the same time.
Campaigning for prostate screening
Since then, the Team GB champion has used his profile to campaign for prostate screening, encouraging men across the country to get checked before it is too late.
In a new interview with BBC Scotland, the 50-year-old said he is "doing really well," adding: "Right now, life just goes on. You could spend your time sitting worrying about the future but that doesn't help you in any shape or form."
Hoy said the responsibility to encourage men to get tested should not fall only on those in the public eye, explaining: "It shouldn't just be down to high-profile individuals like Jeremy Clarkson or myself or any number of men who've been in a similar situation. There should be a more systematic and proactive approach to let men know about their own risk."
Call for systematic approach
With 10,000 men a year in the UK finding out too late that they have prostate cancer, Hoy has called for a formal process to be introduced to make men understand their own personal risk of the disease.
"In the short term, until something more proactive happens you've got to take it on your own shoulders," he said. "It's not what you want to think about and it's always the thing you push down the list of priorities. You forget about it because life's busy."
Hoy's comments come weeks after swimmer and fellow Scotsman Archie Goodburn made a live TV plea to the government for more funding for rare cancer research, having been diagnosed with terminal brain cancer at the age of 22. Prime Minister Andy Burnham subsequently invited Goodburn to a personal meeting to discuss the issues directly.
'Actions speak louder than words'
Vowing that neither he nor Goodburn would be "giving up" in their health battles, Hoy said: "So far, it seems that the powers-that-be are listening. My concern is that you get a lot of publicity from something like that and then the politicians, or the people in power or whoever the decision-makers are, will do something as a reaction - 'oh yes we're going to have a chat' or 'we're going to do this', but actions speak louder than words."
"You want to see some practical change that will actually be implemented, not just a sit-down-and-talk and 'we might address this' and 'we'll have a look at it' because often that means 'we're just going to kick the can down the road' and nothing actually changes," he added. "But Archie's not going to give up and I'm not going to give up."
