{"id":883726,"date":"2026-09-07T22:24:17","date_gmt":"2026-09-07T22:24:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/883726\/"},"modified":"2026-09-07T22:24:17","modified_gmt":"2026-09-07T22:24:17","slug":"pamela-andersons-hepatitis-c-diagnosis-was-a-death-sentence","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/883726\/","title":{"rendered":"Pamela Anderson\u2019s hepatitis C diagnosis \u2018was a death sentence\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"

Pamela Anderson<\/a> has revealed she was delivered a diagnosis that amounted to a \u201cdeath sentence\u201d at the height of her fame in the 1990s.<\/p>\n

Speaking at the amfAR Venezia Gala 2026, hosted by Taika Waititi and presented by Orlando Bloom<\/a>, the 59-year-old actress recalled the day she was diagnosed.<\/p>\n

\"Pamela<\/p>\n

Pamela Anderson has shared a moving insight into her life at the amfAR foundation for aids research gala.\u00a0AP Photo\/Scott A Garfitt<\/p>\n

\u201cBack in the late 90s when I was diagnosed with hepatitis C<\/a> there was no cure,\u201d she said as she collected the Award of Courage at the AIDS charity event.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was a death sentence. That\u2019s what my doctor told me, that I probably had around 10 years to live.\u201d<\/p>\n

The feeling that her diagnosis made her \u201cdamaged goods\u201d led Anderson on a destructive path of self-sabotage.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m sure that coloured and corrupted my decisions,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was not fear of death, but fear of what might happen to my young children. It turned my life inside out.\u201d<\/p>\n

Anderson has previously claimed she contracted hepatitis C by sharing tattoo needles with her first husband, Tommy Lee<\/a>.<\/p>\n

They had two sons together \u2013 Brandon Thomas, born in 1996, and Dylan Jagger, who was born the following year \u2013 and Anderson feared what would happen to her sons if she died young.<\/p>\n

Fortunately, she never had to find out.<\/p>\n

\"Pamela<\/p>\n

Anderson previously claimed sharing needles with ex Tommy Lee led to her hepatitis C diagnosis.\u00a0WireImage<\/p>\n

By the mid-2010s, a new treatment was available for hepatitis C and Anderson was offered the chance to try it, at a cost.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was lucky, I was offered it in its early stages and it took everything I had in my bank to pay for it [because] it wasn\u2019t covered by insurance yet,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Though Anderson felt enormous guilt that other hepatitis C patients couldn\u2019t afford the treatment yet, she was overjoyed to have a cure.<\/p>\n

Today she\u2019s free of the infection but she confessed that the \u201cshame and guilt\u201d she carried for the 10 years she lived with hepatitis C linger even now.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt stays with me. It haunts me,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Anderson turned her own pain into a force for change and has spent more than a decade campaigning to raise awareness and education around hepatitis C, including the fact that there is now a cure.<\/p>\n

\"Pamela<\/p>\n

Today she can speak about her diagnosis freely, but Anderson confessed she struggled with shame and stigma for years.\u00a0Getty<\/p>\n

This isn\u2019t the first time she\u2019s addressed her diagnosis, but it\u2019s the only time she\u2019s gone into such intimate detail about how living with hepatitis C affected her.<\/p>\n

The Last Showgirl star previously spoke about her diagnosis in 2002, when she revealed it publicly for the first time, and in 2003 when she joked that she didn\u2019t expect to survive for another 10 or 15 years.<\/p>\n

Her comments sparked widespread concern at the time, but Anderson didn\u2019t reveal the deep shame and stigma she carried all those years until now.<\/p>\n

Anderson has experienced an incredible Hollywood comeback recently, shedding the sex symbol image<\/a> that was forced upon her in her 20s and revealing her new self<\/a> to the world.<\/p>\n

Gone is the skintight red swimsuit and bold makeup, swapped for a bare-faced approach to beauty<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cI really feel powerful right now when everything\u2019s very pared down,\u201d she told\u00a0WWD<\/a>\u00a0in February 2023.<\/p>\n

\u201cI like to see my freckles. I like when my hair isn\u2019t done. I like just a really fresh face.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Pamela Anderson has revealed she was delivered a diagnosis that amounted to a \u201cdeath sentence\u201d at the height…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":883727,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[64,63,134],"class_list":["post-883726","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-entertainment"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/883726","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=883726"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/883726\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/883727"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=883726"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=883726"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=883726"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}