Leroy Sievers, 53, a broadcast journalist who candidly and poignantly commented on the disease that would take his life in "My Cancer," a popular National Public Radio blog, died Friday at his home in Maryland.
In 2001, Sievers was treated successfully for colon cancer, but four years later brain and lung cancer were diagnosed.
He began his public conversation about the disease by saying, "Death and I are hardly strangers," in a commentary that aired on NPR's "Morning Edition" in early 2006. It was a reference to his quarter-century as a journalist during which he covered more than a dozen wars for CBS and ABC news.
"Leroy gave voice to a topic that we are very uncomfortable with -- death and dying," Ellen McDonnell, NPR's morning programming director said.
Sievers spent 14 years with ABC's "Nightline" and once called it "a dream job," reporting "news that mattered."
LOS ANGELES TIMES
