Tatiana Schlossberg, granddaughter of President John F. Kennedy and an environmental journalist and author, has disclosed that she has been diagnosed with a rare, terminal form of leukemia. In an essay for The New Yorker published on the 62nd anniversary of her grandfather’s assassination, she wrote that more than a year of treatment failed to produce a lasting remission and that the disease will be fatal. Schlossberg is 35, the daughter of Caroline Kennedy and Edwin Schlossberg, married and the mother of two.
Her diagnosis is acute myeloid leukemia with an inversion 3 mutation, a rare genetic subtype usually found in older patients; she first learned of it at age 34. Dr. Clark Alsfeld, a hematology oncologist at Ochsner MD Anderson Cancer Center, described inversion 3 as one of the more aggressive mutations seen in AML, with lower survival rates and limited likelihood of durable remission compared with many other AML types.
Very little is known about what causes this particular subtype or what increases risk. Schlossberg said she had not noticed symptoms and that doctors discovered abnormal blood results on the day she gave birth to her second child, after having swum a mile the previous day. Alsfeld observed that many acute leukemias appear and are detected over a relatively short time span rather than developing slowly over years.
In her account she details the physical and emotional toll of the illness and the pain of watching family members cope alongside her. She also sharply criticized her cousin once removed, Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., for his vaccine skepticism, lack of medical qualifications, and opposition to medical research funding, saying his views made the health system on which she depended seem strained.
Alsfeld said personal essays like Schlossberg’s help humanize diagnoses such as AML and can deepen public understanding. He expressed hope that her story will prompt renewed support for medical research, especially in light of recent federal grant cuts.