‘Today’ Co-Anchor Craig Melvin’s Brother, Lawrence, Dead from Colon Cancer at 43

‘Today’ Show co-anchor Craig Melvin is mourning the death of his older brother Lawrence, who died Wednesday from colon cancer at the age of 43.

“We lost our older brother this week,” Melvin shared Saturday via Instagram.

“Lawrence Meadows was a husband (to Angela, his childhood sweetheart), father (to Addie, 11 and Lawson, 7) Baptist minister, entrepreneur, and one of the best human beings you would’ve ever known,” he continued.

via Page Six:

In 2017, Melvin discussed his brother’s health battle on “Today,” revealing Lawrence had been diagnosed with stage 4 colon cancer at the age of 39.

“You never want to hear about anyone getting a cancer diagnosis, so when I got a call about someone dear to me, it sent me for quite the spin,” Melvin said at the time.

In October of 2016, doctors had removed a baseball-sized tumor from Lawrence’s abdomen and found the cancer had spread.

“Colon cancer robbed him and us of so much,” Melvin continued Saturday. “He was diagnosed at 39. He died Wednesday at 43.”

Melvin also noted how Lawrence “spent a fair amount of time over the past few years raising awareness about the disease.”

“We’ll be keeping up that fight,” Melvin concluded. “We love you, bro.”

Within the US, colorectal cancer is “is the third most common cancer diagnosed in both men and women,” excluding skin cancers, according to the American Cancer Society, and is “the third leading cause of cancer-related deaths in men and in women.”

Prayers go out to Craig and his family.

Men (and women) — but especially Black men — get your colon cancer screenings earlier than recommended. Racism in medicine is more than just how you’re treated at the doctor’s office — it’s in medical research, statistics, and trickles all the way down to doctors’ ‘recommendations.’