Jeremy Clarkson shares health update just days after 'aggressive' prostate cancer diagnosis revealed
The Clarkson's Farm star is in remission from prostate cancer
Jeremy Clarkson has shared a health update saying he's "perfectly fine" just days after it was revealed he had been diagnosed with prostate cancer.
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The former Top Gear host - who is in remission - dropped the bombshell news in the final episodes of the fifth series of Clarkson's Farm.
The 66-year-old revealed that he has been grappling with the diagnosis to his co-stars Charlie and Kaleb Cooper.
Speaking in a video shared to Instagram on Saturday, the Clarkson's Farm star said: "The more observant among you will have noticed I'm not dead. I'm not just not dead, I'm perfectly fine.
"The reason why i'm fine is because the doctors caught the prostate cancer early....They caught it early because I got tested.
"Now, I know a lot of you will say 'I don't want to be tested because it means someone will put their finger in me.' But it's just a blood test these days.
"Look, 10-12,000 men die every year in the UK from prostate cancer. Don't be one of them. Get tested."
He captioned the video: "Thank you so much for all the kind messages I’ve had but now, a announcement."
Speaking also with The Times on Saturday, Clarkson said his news "landed harder than I thought it would."
He explained that the reaction was beyond anything he expected.
“I got woken up last night when people in Australia saw the show and started texting me. The story has landed harder than I thought it would."
Roughly 64,000 British men are diagnosed with prostate cancer every year and 12,000 die from it. If caught early, most men survive. If not treated until it has spread around the body, 50 per cent of men die within five years.
Discussing this, the former Top Gear star said: "It was an aggressive type of cancer. It could have spread, it could have gone into the pancreas, it could have gone anywhere, and that would have been trouble.”
Read More: Jeremy Clarkson 'reduced to tears' after being forced to send his pigs to slaughter
As he discussed the diagnosis in the show with Charlie and Kaleb, the much-loved TV host leant back in his seat before saying: "I've got cancer."
Kaleb, who is visibly shocked in the emotional scenes, asked Jeremy: “No, you haven’t. Where?”
Jeremy responded: “Where it is of no concern of anybody. I’ve known since May.
“I had a medical, you remember, back in May. I disappeared off the other week, and I had a biopsy, and it is cancer, and it’s aggressive, but it’s really early, so the treatment will be, you know.
“I was praying we could get the harvest done and then I could go and get some treatment, but it’s going to be slap bang in the middle.”
After they received the news, Kaleb said: “Look after yourself”, and a visibly upset Charlie added: “Yeah, yeah yeah.”
In more scenes from the new release of episodes, Jeremy mused on a horrid year for his health.
The Who Wants to Be A Millionaire host admitted: “So we started the year and I had coronary heart disease and ended it with me with cancer.
“We can dwell as much as we like on all the bad things that have happened on the farm, but I think it is better now at the end of the year to focus on things that have happened that are good.”
Kaleb then asked: “When will we know if the treatments worked?”
Jeremy replies: “I don’t know, I’ve got a blood test today, there’ll be a blood test and then we’ll know.“Not for another few weeks. Come on, cheer up, it probably did work.”
The show ended on a sombre note, cutting to the veteran host and columnist in a hospital bed.
Jeremy said in the scenes: “So we started season five with me in a hospital bed, and we are at the end of season five and I’m back in a hospital bed.
“Some of the treatment has gone awry, let's say. I’m going to be here for a little while. I’m nil by mouth; I don't know what's going to happen.
“What I wanted to say was if this is all successful, I'll see you for season six, and if it isn’t, I won’t. Take care, everyone.”
The fifth series of the show, which sees Jeremy running Diddly Squat Farm in Oxfordshire, was rocked from the beginning with his heart scare and has finished on a similar note.
The former Grand Tour host is father to daughters Emily and Katya and son Finlo, and has two grandchildren, Arlo and Xanthe.