Today host Savannah Guthrie stopped Monday’s show to remember Brooke Eby, the social media voice who met ALS with humor and built a patient community before dying at 37.
Entertainment Weekly reported that Guthrie set aside time on the morning broadcast to mark Eby’s death and the public trail she left while living with the disease.
Eby died October 1 at age 37. She had appeared on Today in 2023, when Guthrie interviewed her about using comedy to talk about a diagnosis that usually stays behind closed doors.
ALS, also called Lou Gehrig’s disease, is a nervous system illness that damages nerve cells in the brain and spinal cord. It brings progressive muscle weakness. The Mayo Clinic description cited in the coverage notes there is still no cure, though research continues.
Guthrie told viewers she did not want the moment to pass without naming what Eby had done in public.
Before the longer remembrance, she framed the segment in plain terms:
"I want to take a moment to remember a young woman who left a real mark on the world."
She then walked the audience through the core facts of Eby’s illness and the way Eby chose to carry it.
"Our friend Brooke Eby passed away on October 1 after waging a remarkable battle against ALS. It was remarkable for the way she bore that devastating diagnosis that she received at the age of 33."
Guthrie said Eby met the disease with “courage, openness, and humor,” and that she “was determined to share every aspect of her journey.” The videos, Guthrie added, were often hilarious and drew “a devoted following of millions.”
Even as her body failed, Guthrie said, Eby “kept up her fight, kept posting, yes, with that trademark humor and spirit.” She also founded ALStogether, a community for other people living with the disease.
That on-air tone matches what Eby herself told Today during the 2023 visit. She did not sell false hope. She sold candor with a punch line.
"Levity is my superpower, and it’s really how I’m bringing my story to the world."
She added another line that explained the project in one stroke: she was trying to “use humor and really let ALS be heard.”
Cohost Craig Melvin said he remembered the interview and put the point simply.
"She was quite the inspiration."
The timeline in the coverage is spare and hard. Eby first showed symptoms in 2018. Doctors made the official ALS diagnosis in 2022, when she was 33. That same year she posted her first video about living with the condition.
By 2023 she was sitting across from Guthrie in the Today studio, already turning private decline into a public file other patients could watch. She died about three years after that visit, at 37.
Guthrie closed the tribute with age and absence, not slogans: “Brooke Eby was 37 years old, and she will be missed.”
Eby’s father, identified as Cliff, sent Today a statement that refused both despair theater and miracle talk. He thanked the people who followed his daughter and scored the result without pretending the scoreboard changed.
"Her efforts didn’t find a cure for the next Brooke, but she wounded the ALS monster. We are so grateful to all her followers and supporters."
Monday’s segment was a standard broadcast courtesy that still required a choice. Guthrie used national airtime on a living patient’s terms, openness, jokes, and a patient-built network, rather than a vague celebrity farewell.
Viewers who track the co-host through Hoda Kotb’s remarks on her grit know she has carried heavy personal news while staying on the job. The Eby remembrance fit that same outward discipline: name the person, credit the work, leave the rest alone.
Eby’s method also sidestepped the usual script. She did not wait for an agency campaign to define ALS for her. She posted, organized ALStogether, and told a morning audience that humor was how the story would travel.
Families watching long medical fights will recognize the father’s line. Progress can be real and still fall short of a cure. Gratitude for supporters does not require a press-friendly ending.
Guthrie’s own recent stretches away from the desk, including periods described in reporting on her absences from Today, make the Monday choice sharper. She came in and spent capital on a guest many casual viewers might have forgotten.
The medical facts remain blunt. Symptoms can start years before a formal label. The label, when it comes, still meets a disease with no present cure. Eby’s answer was to keep the camera on and keep other patients from going quiet.
In separate coverage of her plea over her mother’s case, Guthrie has shown she knows how public attention can stall. That backdrop helps explain why a clean, specific tribute matters. Eby got dates, age, cause, and credit for the community she built.
ALS Network remembrance pages and Today’s own video package now sit beside the social clips Eby made after 2022. The record she forced into the open is larger than any single segment.
For a morning show, the risk is always soft language that dissolves the dead into branding. Guthrie kept the edges: diagnosis at 33, death at 37, millions of followers, a father who said the monster was wounded and not slain.
Other recent Guthrie threads on the site, including a weapons and drug booking tied to a person questioned in her family case, underscore how often her name trends for pain outside the studio. Monday she pointed the trend line at Brooke Eby instead.
That is the useful hierarchy in a culture quick to recycle grief. The patient who told the truth with jokes got the minute. The host did her job and then got out of the way.
Courage on camera does not repeal a terminal diagnosis. It does force a hard disease into daylight, and that is work worth honoring in full.