Beloved ABC New York anchor Bill Ritter reveals symptoms he experienced years before Alzheimer’s diagnosis - New York Post

See more of our coverage in your search results. Add The New York Post on Google Veteran ABC New York news anchor Bill Ritter said he started “forgetting people’s names and places” two years before his heartbreaking Alzheimer’s diagnosis. Ritter — who announced he was stepping away from the news desk last week — said his symptoms got to the point that he “didn’t know why” the symptoms were happening, even despite dropping out of anchoring the 11 p.m. newscast. Bill Ritter’s appearance on “Good Morning America” on Monday. ABC Ritter announced last week he’d be leaving the news desk in light of the diagnosis. WABC Although Ritter, 76, was able to get “a decent night’s sleep … for the first time in 25 years” with his schedule trimmed down to the 6 p.m. broadcast, his symptoms still “weren’t getting better,” he said on Monday’s “Good Morning America.” Upon making that realization, he decided to get tested for the progressive neurodegenerative brain disease. “That really was an important thing. A lot of people say, ‘I’m fine, don’t worry about it, I’m going to be fine.’ No. You gotta go do this,” he recalled of his decision to seek medical attention. Ritter said his “first reaction” upon being diagnosed was to think of his father, who died of Alzheimer’s in 1998. “Then a couple of seconds later, I was scared,” Ritter recalled. “I don’t mind saying that. It was scary. Because it was like, ‘Wait a minute, I’m supposed to be doing this. What’s going on here?’ “I quickly moved into husband/dad place,” the journalist continued. “Because Alzheimer’s really affects the family most. As a dad and a husband, I said, ‘I gotta deal with this. This is my family. And that’s what I’m really worried about.’” He shared his diagnosis Friday as he announced his retirement after more than a quarter-century as a fixture of New York television news. “It’s ‘early stage’ Alzheimer’s, and they say the treatments I’m getting are keeping it at bay. For now. But there is no guarantee, because there’s no cure yet for Alzheimer’s. So, unless someone finds an amazing cure, and soon, tonight will be the last newscast I anchor,” he said during the emotional broadcast. The father of three shared on air that he has a grandson on the way and plans to focus on family. “Spending more time with my family has now become even more important, because my life has taken a turn,” he said. The longtime newsman will stay on with the network to help report on Alzheimer’s. “After this interview, I’m going to go to our Monday morning meeting at 9 a.m. … and then I’m going to go to my desk and have Day 1 of the new job,” Ritter said on Monday. “And that will be to bring people into the tent, because I think that’s what we want.” Earlier in his career, he earned four Emmy Awards for his investigative work at San Diego’s KNSD-TV.  Those honors stemmed from his reporting on a 1989 stock scandal and a 1987 investigation into safety protocols at Sea World of California regarding trainers and killer whales.  He began co-anchoring “Good Morning America Sunday” in 1993 and became a “20/20” correspondent in 1997, reporting on health-related investigative stories, from prostate cancer awareness ot the COVID-19 pandemic. “Bill is strong, brilliant and resourceful, and we look forward to his continued reporting on Eyewitness News,” ABC said.