‘Very traumatic’: Seven sports presenter Mel McLaughlin reveals shock cancer diagnosis

Seven sports presenter Mel McLaughlin, 46, has revealed she has been fighting lung cancer after being diagnosed in December. It’s the same disease that took her older sister Tara’s life in 2015, at the age of 39.

The broadcaster, who has been with the network since 2016 presenting sports news on the Sydney weeknight bulletin and hosting marquee events including the Olympics and Commonwealth Games, hasn’t appeared on air since hosting Seven’s summer cricket coverage. There had been much speculation in media circles about McLaughlin’s absence from the airwaves over the past two months.

“The reason that I wanted to [speak now] is not to talk about me,” said McLaughlin in a pre-recorded interview with colleague and friend Mark Ferguson on Wednesday night. “It’s awareness. It’s the biggest cancer killer in the country … I owe it to my sister. I owe it to people that maybe could get something out of it. Smoker, non-smoker – no one deserves lung cancer.”

Extraordinarily, McLaughlin revealed she delayed surgery at Sydney’s North Shore Private Hospital to have “half her lung cut out” to host coverage of the Boxing Day Test and Sydney’s Pink Test, which raises funds for cancer charity The McGrath Foundation. She underwent surgery the next day.

Seated back at the Sydney Cricket Ground for her interview with Ferguson, McLaughlin described the news as “very traumatic”.

“In our family, lung cancer meant death. We had one example, and we lost her,” she said.

The broadcaster has been an ambassador for Lung Foundation Australia since Tara’s death, advocating for increases in funding to fight the disease and working to decrease social stigma. “If someone is diagnosed with lung cancer, the first question shouldn’t be, ‘Oh, so they smoke?’ … it doesn’t matter,” she wrote on social media, a few years after her sister’s passing.

Now McLaughlin – a non-smoker, like her sister – has been receiving treatment in the same ward of the same hospital her family know so well.

“I cried, and then I laughed because it’s like, is someone having … Is this a joke?” McLaughlin said during the interview.

Thankfully her tumour was detected earlier than her sister’s – stage two – ensuring she could receive treatment. “Recovery is slow, but good,” she said. “[I’m] steady for now.”

A spokesperson for 7News issued a statement to other outlets in February confirming McLaughlin was on “some well-earned leave … and will be back in a couple of weeks ahead of the NRL season”, but scrutiny intensified when she was absent from the opening round coverage that commenced last weekend.

Former Seven broadcaster Matt White has been filling in her absence.

McLaughlin is keen to return to work soon, half-joking that she might be back on air as soon as next week, though her colleague made it clear she was still “determined” to host the Commonwealth Games, which start in July, and the Rugby League World Cup in October.

Ray Kuka, Seven’s director of news and current affairs, said in a statement the presenter has the network’s “unwavering support as she focuses on recovery”.

Chris Jones, Seven’s director of sport, added: “As has always been the plan and if she’s ready, Mel will play a critical role in the network’s Commonwealth Games coverage from Glasgow, doing what she loves most – being in the thick of the action with our golden Australian team. We look forward to her sharing more of those moments with viewers on Seven’s cricket and Rugby League World Cup coverage later this year.

“Now Mel has bravely chosen to share what she’s been facing these past few months, we ask for everyone to be respectful while she focuses on her health and wellbeing.”

Seven will run a special segment on McLaughlin’s journey, Her Call to Arms, at 6pm on Thursday.

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