Industry star Marisa Abela has opened up on her cancer diagnosis and the surgery that followed, admitting the “scariest thing” was the fear of never speaking again.
The actress, now 29, was diagnosed with thyroid cancer in 2020 aged 23, requiring an eight-hour operation to remove a tumour from her neck.
Speaking on the How To Fail with Elizabeth Day podcast, Abela reflected on feeling “bleak” at the time, with her biggest concern being the potential inability to talk post-operation.
Her diagnosis came during the Covid-19 pandemic, after she initially went to hospital with symptoms like brain fog, believing she had the virus. She underwent a total thyroidectomy and had around 19 lymph nodes removed.
According to the NHS website, a total thyroidectomy is a surgical cancer treatment which involves removing all of a person’s thyroid.
She said: “Obviously you never expect to get to be told that you have cancer at 23. The aftermath of the whole thing was scary to me.
“I knew I was ill, I could tell something was really wrong and then I just switched into, like, ‘get it out, get it out’ mode, and: ‘Am I going to be able to speak again?’”
She added: “That was the scariest thing, because they had to go through a lot of nerves to get to my thyroid, and one of the things was I had to sign a form that said if they cut the nerve that’s attached to my voice box, I’m not going to sue them or whatever.
“I remember when I woke up, the first thing I did was go, ‘maaa’, because I just wanted to make sure I could talk.”
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Abela said she was also worried about the scar on her neck, and whether it would affect her work as an actress.
The Back To Black star described receiving her diagnosis as “very scary”, and said: “It was on my thyroid and I was aware that that was potentially going to cause hormonal issues throughout my life. That was very scary.
“Just the aftermath of the whole thing was scary to me.
“It was an eight-hour surgery and it was in the middle of Covid, so I had to go in on my own.
“I was put in the burns unit for recovery because there weren’t enough beds in the ICU, so 2020 was bleak for me.”
Abela said her husband, actor Jamie Bogyo who she married in 2025, was an “immense help” through her diagnosis.
She said: “He is the most supportive person in every way.”
The actress won a Bafta for best actress in 2025, for her role in the hit BBC drama Industry as young graduate Yasmin Kara-Hanani.
She has also appeared in films Barbie (2023), She Is Love (2022), and starred in the Amy Winehouse biopic, Back To Black (2024).
The full interview with Marisa Abela is available on the How to Fail with Elizabeth Day podcast.
