Celebrity Survivor Dies at Age 16 January 17, 2001
By Matt Terry CureHodgkins.com Editor
The Hodgkin’s community lost one of their prominent young spokespersons Saturday, Jan. 13, when 16 year old Michael Cuccione died of complications from respitory failure in his hometown of Vancouver, British Columbia. Michael, better known as “Q.T.” from MTV’s spoof boy band 2Gether, died less than five years after receiving his last treatment back on on August 1, 1996.
Michael’s uncle had reported to MTV News that past treatments had left him unable to move air properly through his lungs. A problem with his diaphragm developed and he was forced to tape episodes of the MTV show "2gether" while carrying a portable oxygen machine. His character had a fictional illness, "biliary thrombosis," but Cuccione really had suffered from Hodgkin's Lymphoma as a child, undergoing five months of chemotherapy and a stem cell transplant to treat a 1996 relapse.
Ever since the age of 9, Michael had been working to raise money for Hodgkin’s research and Cancer awareness, recording his first album Making a Difference to raise funding for a cancer foundation in his name. He also co-authored a book in 1998, There Are Survivors, which chronicles his life with cancer. Michael died only a week after celebrating his 16th birthday.
