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CBS News Legend Don Hewitt Fighting Cancer

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Mar 19, 2009 9:02 am US/Mountain

CBS News Legend Don Hewitt Fighting Cancer

Founder of '60 Minutes' Says He Has Pancreatic Cancer; Prognosis Good

CBS News Interactive: Cancer

NEW YORK (CBS) ―

Click to enlarge 1 of 1: Don Hewitt, right, founder of CBS News' "60 Minutes" news magazine program, says he is being treated for pancreatic cancer but has been told his prognosis is good. Hewitt is pictured in this file photo with the late "60 Minutes" correspondent Ed Bradley.
CBS

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CBS News Interactive: Cancer

Don Hewitt, the broadcast journalism legend who founded CBS News' "60 Minutes," the first reporter-centric investigative television news magazine program, has revealed he has cancer.

Hewitt told the New York Times that doctors found a cancerous growth in his pancreas, the abdominal organ that produces insulin and enzymes that aid in the digestive process.

The founder and founding executive producer of "60 Minutes" said his doctors had informed him his prognosis was good, even though pancreatic cancer is generally one of the least survivable forms of the disease. The five-year survival rate is less than five percent, according to the World Health Organization.

Most pancreatic cancer patients have poor prognoses because their tumors aren't discovered until the cancer has already spread to other organs. Hewitt, however, said his doctors did not believe his tumor had spread. He was to check into New York's Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center Friday to begin treatment, he told the paper.

Hewitt retired in 2004 after serving as "60 Minutes'" founding executive producer starting in 1968. In 1960, he produced the first televised presidential debate in U.S. history, between Republican Vice President Richard Nixon and Sen. John F. Kennedy, D-Mass, in Chicago. Because the vice president wasn't feeling well and refused make-up, he appeared pale and clammy on TV, while Kennedy appeared healthy and youthful. That led most who watched the debate to believe Kennedy won, while most of those who listened on the radio thought Nixon was the victor.

Hewitt is 86 years old.