Chopped Junior Winner Fuller Goldsmith's Cause Of Death Explained
"Chopped Junior" winner Fuller Goldsmith, 17, died Tuesday after a yearslong battle with cancer, WIAT reported. The cooking enthusiast, who was from Tuscaloosa, Alabama, was diagnosed with acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) when he was 3 years old (via People). His cancer returned five times in his short lifetime. In February, he shared in an Instagram post that the same leukemia he'd had before returned and he was gearing up for a fifth round of radiation at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. The disease had been in remission for four years at that point in time, per WIAT.
There are several types of leukemia, which include acute myeloid leukemia, chronic lymphoblastic leukemia, chronic myeloid leukemia, chronic myelomonocytic leukemia, and ALL. Of those, ALL is the most common kind of cancer in children, per the American Cancer Society (ACS). The disease usually occurs in children between the ages of 3 and 5, with about 3,000 people diagnosed with the condition yearly (via St Jude).
Acute lymphoblastic leukemia
In children who have acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL), the bone marrow produces too many immature white blood cells, called lymphocytes. These kinds of cells crowd the bone marrow, leaving little room for healthy blood cells, thus making it difficult for white blood cells to fight infection. The condition can progress quickly if left untreated (via National Cancer Institute). About 98% of children diagnosed with ALL go into remission following treatment, and 90% can be cured of the disease, according to St Jude. Treatment usually involves radiation, chemotherapy, stem cell transplants, targeted therapy, or types of immunotherapy. Sometimes ALL does not respond to treatment or returns after treatment, as it did in Fuller Goldsmith's case.
When Goldsmith was just 14, he won the "Chopped Junior" competition and donated his entire winnings to benefit pediatric cancer patients. As the New York Post reported, he gave his $10,000 earnings to Birmingham Children's Hospital's Division of Hematology and Pediatric Oncology.