Longtime ABC New York TV anchor Bill Ritter is moving away from the anchor desk.
Ritter announced his retirement earlier this week, noting that Friday, June 12, will be his last time anchoring the news on New York’s WABC TV. 76-year-old Ritter joined the station in 1998 and has anchored the newscast at 18.00 since 2001. The reason for his retirement is due to an Alzheimer’s diagnosis.
“After a series of tests, my doctors have told me I have Alzheimer’s. It’s early stage Alzheimer’s, and they say the treatments I’m getting are keeping it at bay. For now,” Ritter told WABC viewers late last week.
He admitted that he was increasingly forgetting names and places over the past two years.
Ritter later added, “… there’s no guarantee, because there’s no cure for Alzheimer’s yet. So unless someone finds an amazing cure, and soon, tonight (Friday, June 12) will be the last newscast I appeal.”
When Ritter first noticed Alzheimer’s symptoms, he walked away from the broadcasts at 5 p.m. and 11 p.m. and trimmed his workload down to only The 18.00 news. Despite the shortened schedule, his symptoms did not improve.
He told Good morning America that when he heard about his diagnosis, his first thought was of his father, who died of Alzheimer’s in 1998. “… It was scary. Because it was like, ‘Wait a minute, I’m going to do this. What’s going on here?’
“I quickly moved into the husband/father place. Because Alzheimer’s really affects the family the most. As a father and a husband, I said, ‘I have to deal with this. This is my family. And that’s what I’m really worried about.'”
Prior to his tenure at WABC, Ritter worked in local television throughout California and also for the Los Angeles Times.
Despite his retirement and diagnosis, Ritter won’t be leaving ABC All New York. He will contribute to the station by covering Alzheimer’s disease in a special role. Ritter said the station’s website that his coverage of the disease will report on “the rising tide of Alzheimer’s and other similar diseases, including how it affects patients and their families, how the cost of treatment and the cost of caring for patients is simply prohibitive, and how this country can begin to change that.”
Ritter also shared that he plans to spend more time with his family.
