Jeremy Hunt’s brother Charlie, 53, dies of cancer just weeks after the Chancellor spoke of family’s ‘tough battles’ with the disease

• Charlie Hunt died last week aged 53 from a rare tumour known as sarcoma
• Read: Jeremy Hunt hopes research will ‘lift the curse of cancer from humanity’

Jeremy Hunt’s younger brother has died of cancer just weeks after the Chancellor spoke of his family’s ‘tough battles’ with the disease.

Charlie Hunt passed away last week aged 53, having been fighting the rare and aggressive type of tumour known as sarcoma for almost three years.

A funeral service for the married father-of-three and successful businessman will be held in Surrey.

The Chancellor spoke in an interview with The Daily Mail last month of how cancer has hit his family, claiming the lives of both their parents while he himself needed early treatment for skin cancer.

On his JustGiving page, Charlie told how he had undergone years of gruelling treatment after being diagnosed with sarcoma in 2020.

Jeremy Hunt’s younger brother Charlie Hunt, 53, (right) has died of cancer just weeks after the Chancellor spoke of his family’s ‘tough battles’ with the disease. The brothers ran the London Marathon together last October, raising almost £50,000 for Sarcoma UK

The Chancellor spoke in an interview with The Daily Mail last month of how cancer has hit his family, claiming the lives of both their parents while he himself needed early treatment for skin cancer

He described undergoing surgery on his right leg, adding: ‘Since then the battle has continued with surgery on both of my lungs.

‘I have been in and out of hospital pretty constantly but have received excellent treatment from the NHS and am still fighting on nearly three years later.

‘It does, however, remain a huge battle for me and my family. I asked Jeremy to run the marathon for the first time with me – an offer that was nervously accepted!’

The brothers ran the London Marathon together last October, raising almost £50,000 for Sarcoma UK and The Royal Surrey Cancer & Surgical Innovation Centre.

Jeremy, 56, told the Mail last month how he himself once had a mole in his head that ‘just grew and grew’ and had to be removed.

The Chancellor has also called for investment to catch more cancers early and ‘lift the curse from humanity’

‘I was a cabinet minister at the time, not in my current job, but it was obviously the first time that the ‘C word’ had been used in terms of my own health so that makes you sit up,’ he said.

‘But I was blessed. It was not a life-threatening cancer and it was caught relatively early.

READ MORE: Jeremy Hunt reveals how he hopes UK research will ‘lift the curse of cancer from humanity’ as he talks about his own battle with the disease: ‘It was the first time that the ‘C word’ had been used in terms of my own health so that makes you sit up’

‘I had superb treatment from the NHS to remove it, but I am very aware of members of my own family who have had much tougher battles against cancer, and I know that’s what families are going through up and down the country.’

Charlie was founder and chief of executive of Soak and Sleep, an online bed and bath products retailer.

The Chancellor has also called for investment to catch more cancers early and ‘lift the curse from humanity’.

‘We need to focus on early diagnosis because if you pick up cancers early, it’s much more likely that you’ll completely cure someone,’ he said.

‘It’s about half the cost for the NHS if you pick up cancer at stage one or two rather than three and four so that’s why diagnostic centres are very important.’

Mr Hunt also had to deal with the tragic death of his sister Sarah when she was just 10 months old. When he was two years old, she drowned in the bath while she was next to him.

‘I don’t talk about that normally,’ he said in 2019.

‘This is the sort of tragedy that has a profound affect on families. I do know it affected my parents.’

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