Former breakfast TV presenter Fiona Phillips husband Martin Frizzell has given a health update about the star’s health amidst her ongoing battle with Alzheimer’s. The former GMTV presenter received her diagnosis in early 2022 at just 61-years-old and announced the news the following year. Fiona, now 65, presented GMTV from 1993 to 2008, and had an illustrious career, fronting numerous documentaries and Panorama episodes.
Appearing on Good Morning Britain to decry the government’s lack of funding for research into the condition, which affects more than 520,000 people in the UK, he revealed she no longer wants to talk about her illness. “The way she gets through it now – [it] was she absolutely was talking about it – but now her way of dealing with it, and everyone’s different, is that she doesn’t want to talk about the A word, and so we don’t. So she will just believe that she has chronic depression, which she does have, which is another symptom as well,” he said.
However, he had earlier assured hosts Ed Balls and Susanna Reid: “She is still very much with us. She still looks the same.
“She was the world’s most stubborn woman. Now she still is the world’s most stubborn woman, which means it is difficult to try and give her a bit of medicine,” he quipped.
The presenter previously admitted it is “frightening and confusing” living with Alzheimer’s disease, but hoped to show how life “can still bring joy” in the book.
Alzheimer’s disease is the most common form of dementia. But overall, roughly 1 million people are living with some form of dementia in the UK with this number projected to rise to 1.4 million by 2040 as the population ages.
Both her parents suffered with the condition but Martin said they had done a test which concluded Fiona’s Alzheimer’s isn’t genetic, although “she was just more predisposed to it”.
“But we never spoke about it,” he admitted. “Maybe we should. Maybe the lesson is that people should speak about these things.
“It’s a difficult discussion to have. What do we do if X, Y and Z happens, and how would you like us to do this sort of stuff,” he said.