Oprah Winfrey Reveals Breast Cancer Scare

Estwhile talk-show host let slip last month that she feared she might have developed the disease

By Josh Grossberg Nov 26, 2012 9:28 PMTags
Oprah WinfreyJon Kopaloff/Getty Images

For a brief moment, Oprah Winfrey experienced a health scare that thousands of women unfortunately endure each year.

The media queen took the stage in mid-October at an annual conference in Los Angeles for O, The Oprah Magazine, and revealed to more than 5,000 fans that the week before she had thought she might have breast cancer.

As described in an account of the event in Monday's New York Times, the 58-year-old Winfrey subsequently reassured her ardent followers, many of whom were female, that it was a false alarm.

Nonetheless, the revelation came as a shock not only to the audience but to Oprah's BFF, Gayle King, who became visibly upset. That prompted one woman in the crowd to reportedly reproach Winfrey for not filling her friend in on her condition and urged her to apologize to King.

No word whether the OWN honcho actually offered up a public mea culpa, and her rep was unavailable for comment.

Winfrey also spent a portion of her time at the podium defending herself from criticism lobbed at her for the underwhelming ratings performance of her TV network.

Just remember, Oprah, if you have your health, you have your wealth!