Former President Joe Biden’s prostate cancer has spread beyond his bones and is causing significant pain, his son Hunter Biden said in a BBC interview broadcast Friday. The update represents the most serious public description yet of the former president’s condition, although a Biden spokesman declined to comment on Hunter Biden’s account Saturday.
The Joe Biden cancer diagnosis was first disclosed in May 2025, when his office said an aggressive form of prostate cancer had already metastasized to bone. Biden, now 83, subsequently underwent hormone therapy and radiation treatment, but his family had released relatively few detailed medical updates before Hunter Biden’s latest remarks.
Joe Biden Cancer Update Comes From His Son
Hunter Biden described his father’s condition as painful and debilitating while discussing the former president’s health in a broader BBC interview. He said the disease had metastasized into Biden’s bones and further, indicating progression beyond what the family publicly disclosed when the diagnosis was announced last year.
That statement should be treated as a family account rather than a formal medical bulletin. Biden’s spokesman declined to elaborate, and no new physician’s report has been released publicly confirming which additional organs or tissues may now be affected.
The distinction matters because reporting on an individual’s cancer should not move beyond what the patient, family or treating medical team has actually disclosed. Hunter Biden’s comments clearly establish that the family views his father’s illness as more painful and burdensome, but they do not provide enough clinical detail to independently characterize the precise extent of the progression.
Despite that deterioration, Hunter Biden said his father continues to engage publicly and remains interested in political and national issues. Biden also has a memoir, “Promise Me, America,” scheduled for release after the midterm elections in November.
Biden’s Original Diagnosis Was Already Serious
Biden’s office announced in May 2025 that doctors had diagnosed him after he experienced urinary symptoms and a prostate nodule was discovered. His cancer carried a Gleason score of 9, placing it among the more aggressive prostate cancers, and had already spread to his bones when it was detected.
The family said at the time that the cancer was hormone-sensitive, a medically important characteristic because prostate cancer cells often depend on male hormones to grow. The National Cancer Institute explains that hormone therapy can slow progression of metastatic prostate cancer, although treatment decisions and outcomes vary substantially between individual patients.
By October 2025, a spokesman confirmed that Biden was receiving radiation treatment and hormone therapy. Those treatments can be used in advanced prostate cancer, but the existence of treatment does not by itself indicate whether the disease is responding, stable or progressing in a particular patient.
Cancer that has spread to bone can cause substantial pain and other complications. The National Cancer Institute notes that bone metastases in advanced prostate cancer can be associated with intense pain, weakness and fractures, although Hunter Biden did not provide detailed information about the specific source of his father’s pain.
The Family Faces a More Difficult Stage
The latest disclosure places a different emphasis on Biden’s health than his own public comments shortly after the original diagnosis. In May 2025, Biden said he felt optimistic about treatment and described his prognosis positively, while his office emphasized that the cancer’s hormone sensitivity created options for medical management.
Hunter Biden’s account more than a year later suggests the illness is now having a greater physical effect. He said watching his father’s condition had been difficult for the family and expressed frustration that the former president did not complain more about what he was experiencing.
Former first lady Jill Biden had also spoken publicly in June about the toll of her husband’s treatment. She said the cancer diagnosis had changed the family’s perspective and described the consequences of cancer drugs and treatment as difficult, without providing a detailed clinical update.
Those accounts provide a clearer picture of the personal burden of the disease without establishing a specific prognosis. The National Cancer Institute emphasizes that metastatic prostate cancer treatment has changed substantially, with several combinations of hormonal and other therapies available depending on the disease and the patient.
Biden Remains a Major Political Figure
Biden’s health inevitably carries political interest because he served as president from 2021 through 2025 and because questions about his age and physical condition became central to the final year of his presidency. Those debates intensified after his 2024 debate performance and eventual withdrawal from the presidential race.
That history should not turn a cancer update into an opportunity for speculation about undisclosed medical conditions. The legitimate public-interest question is what Biden and his family choose to disclose about the health of a former president who remains active in public life, not unsupported assumptions about what his doctors may know.
Biden has continued making selected public appearances despite treatment, including attending the dedication of Barack Obama’s presidential library in June. Hunter Biden’s description suggests those appearances should not be interpreted as evidence that the illness is painless or medically minor.
The new Joe Biden cancer update is therefore both a significant health development and a reminder of the limits of publicly available information. Hunter Biden has described worsening disease and serious pain, but a full assessment of the former president’s current condition will require a medical update from Biden or his physicians.
