Inside Jools Holland's cancer battle from diagnosis to fierce awareness fight

22 June 2024 , 20:30

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Jools Holland kept his condition quiet for eight years

Jools Holland has been raising awareness around prostate cancer after receiving a life-changing diagnosis of his own.

The musician, 66, is back on BBC Two this Saturday, from 10.30pm, taking the reigns of Later... with Jools Holland which he has been loyally hosting since 1992. But in March 2022, Julian Miles Holland - as he is legally known - made headlines when he broke an eight-year-long silence to reveal he had been diagnosed with prostate cancer in 2014.

The former Squeeze band member made the revelation as he announced a star-studded event in partnership with the charity Prostate Cancer UK and remembered his diagnosis as nothing short of shocking as he showed no symptoms.

At the time he dropped the bombshell, Holland had joined forces with the charity for a musical even titled Raise the Roof which featured a string of well-known music names and equally famous comedians as they took to the stage at the Royal Albert Hall.

Jools Holland is understood to be cancer-free but continues to fight to raise awareness around prostate cancer (BBC/Samantha Wynn)

"I had no awareness of prostate cancer, no symptoms that I noticed whatsoever until I was diagnosed following a routine blood test in 2014", Holland said. Luckily, the cancer had been caught at the right time. "Thankfully I was successfully treated, but if more people were aware of their risk and caught the disease early, then more lives would be saved.

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Remembering his own experience with the illness, Holland was adamant about encouraging caution around the condition: "If I can bring people’s awareness to the facts of prostate cancer then I would certainly stand on top of my piano and shout about it because I think it’s really important."

"People often think ‘this is something that happens to other people’. It’s not like I felt any different", Holland insisted, "it’s not like I suddenly felt ill, except you suddenly have this thing hanging over your head and you think ‘hang on, don’t people die from all this?’ So obviously that was of concern, but then once I started talking to Professor Waxman I realised there are all sorts of ways of dealing with it if caught early."

Despite the shock, Holland made it clear he was thankful to have undergone his routine test at the right time. "Had I not had that routine test, where something had shown up, then I would have just gone on and on until it was perhaps too late to have done anything about it. And that’s why it’s really important for men to be aware of the facts of prostate cancer and understand their risk."

While it is understood that Holland is now cancer-free, he is still as involved in raising awareness around prostate cancer and was pleased when King Charles III spoke out publicly about his own cancer ordeal in February 2024 - before a palace spokesperson denied that the monarch had been diagnosed with the illness.

Holland spoke out at the time alongside Sir Rod Stewart, who was also diagnosed with the illness in 2019, during an appearance on the set of Loose Women.

Laura Carreno