Gaming Superstar Has Skin Cancer

One of the gaming world's biggest superstars says he has been diagnosed with skin cancer, but it was caught early and doctors are optimistic. Tyler "Ninja" Blevins has around 19 million followers on the Twitch platform, where he is best known for playing Fortnite, Rolling Stone reports. In a post on X Tuesday, the 32-year-old said he is "still in a bit of shock" at the diagnosis, which came after an annual skin and mole check. "There was a mole on the bottom of my foot that they wanted to remove just to be careful," Blevins said. "It came back as melanoma, but they are optimistic that we caught it in the early stages."

Blevins said doctors biopsied another dark spot near the mole on Tuesday and removed an area near the melanoma "with the hopes that under the microscope they will see clear non-melanoma edges and we will know we got it." Melanoma, usually caused by ultraviolet light from the sun or tanning beds, is a form of skin cancer that can spread to other parts of the body. "The risk of melanoma seems to be increasing in people under 40, especially women," according to the Mayo Clinic. The BBC reports that "people with pale skin, a large number of moles, and history of skin cancer in their family" are most at risk. "I'm grateful to have hope in finding this early, but please take this as a PSA to get skin checkups," Blevins wrote. (More skin cancer stories.)