Tony Christie shares health update after dementia diagnosis
The singer gave a health update during an appearance on ITV's This Morning
What did you miss?
Tony Christie has shared an update with fans after revealing that he had been diagnosed with dementia.
The singer told fans about his diagnosis last year, saying on TV show Steph’s Packed Lunch that he planned to keep working. “My grandad used to say, ‘you retire, you die’ and I just said I’m not going to die,” he said. “I’m going to carry on and carry on… I feel good. I can carry on forever, that’s how I feel.”
Christie has now updated fans during an appearance on ITV’s This Morning, sharing that he is doing well.
What, how, and why?
His wife Sue was also on the show and explained that she was the one who urged Christie to get checked out, after she spotted that he was struggling with cryptic crosswords which he’d always breezed through. She said the singer was getting “really cranky” and “throwing it down” and that he was also forgetting some names.
“I did notice that it upset him more, when he forgot names,” she said. “So I knew... He was no different on stage, still had this great voice, still has the great voice.”
“Get it in time,” she urged. Host Dermot O’Leary chimed in to say the star was on medication and doing “pretty well”.
“Yeah, yeah,” agreed Christie. Sue also agreed, saying if dementia was diagnosed and treatment put in place you could “go on for a long long time”.
What else did Tony Christie say?
The star also told how he was amazed that his voice had remained strong. "I still can’t believe it, I’m 80 years old and I’m singing as good as I was 50 years ago," he said.
Presenter Alison Hammond asked what Christie’s secret was and why he had stayed “so fit”, and he laughed: “I don’t know!”
“He’s well cared for,” smiled Sue, as the presenters giggled. “All the vitamins and the good food, keep him off the booze,” she added.
According to the NHS, dementia is “not a single illness, but a group of symptoms caused by damage to the brain”. It says things to look out for include memory loss, problems thinking or reasoning, or finding it hard to follow conversations or TV shows, feeling anxious, depressed or angry about memory loss or feeling confused.
Read more: Tony Christie
Watch: Tony Christie 'ignored' dementia diagnosis at first
