If we forgot that the novel coronavirus isn’t the only danger out there, though, we were reminded of the error

of that thinking on Thursday.

Ron Rivera, the new head coach of the Washington Football Team, revealed in an interview with ESPN that he has been diagnosed with squamous cell carcinoma. Just a few hours earlier, Baltimore Orioles hall of famer Cal Ripken Jr. had announced that he was “fully recovered” from prostate cancer surgery in March.

That’s a lot to process in one day. And it should remind us of what’s really important.

This isn’t some armchair opinion. It comes from someone who had the same procedure that Ripken underwent just a month after he did—and who has happily gotten similar encouraging results.

Like the Iron Man, I was fortunate to be diagnosed early and to have my prostate removed with no apparent spread of the cancer. Both our conditions will require monitoring, but my recovery, like Ripken’s, has been encouraging, with relatively minimal disruption beyond what everyone has had to endure in this strangest of years.

We can only hope for similar good fortune for Rivera, who consulted his doctors after discovering a lump on his neck earlier this month received his cancer diagnosis.