Toronto mayor has rare cancer

Associated Press

TORONTO

Toronto Mayor Rob Ford has a rare and difficult cancer that will require aggressive chemotherapy, his doctor said Wednesday.

Dr. Zane Cohen, a colorectal surgeon at Mount Sinai hospital, said Ford has a malignant liposarcoma. Ford has been hospitalized for a week with a tumor in his abdomen.

Cohen said the mayor will be treated with fairly intensive chemotherapeutic agents within the next two days. He said the cancer is spreading and that they have found “a small nodule in the buttock” near the left hip.

The doctor said Ford’s cancer makes up only about 1 percent of all cancers but that he was optimistic about Ford’s treatment because they have many experts in sarcoma at the hospital. He said there may or may not be surgery involved depending on how the first treatments go.

The mayor withdrew his re-election bid Friday, dramatically ending a campaign he had doggedly pursued despite calls for him to quit amid drug and alcohol scandals and a stint in rehab.