The professional dancer Amy Dowden will not be continuing with this year’s season of Strictly Come Dancing to recover from a foot injury.
The development was revealed on the spin-off show Strictly It Takes Two on BBC Two on Monday and comes after a period of absence from the show for Dowden.
Fellow professional dancer Lauren Oakley will step in as the dance partner for celebrity contestant JB Gill, best known for being part of the boyband JLS.
A Strictly Come Dancing spokesperson said: “Sadly, Amy Dowden MBE will not be partaking in the rest of the competition this year.
“While Amy focuses on her recovery following a foot injury, fellow professional dancer Lauren Oakley will step in as JB’s dance partner. The health and wellbeing of everyone involved in Strictly are always the utmost priority. The whole Strictly family sends Amy love and well wishes.”
Dowden returned to the BBC talent show this year, having missed the previous series after being diagnosed with breast cancer.
She said in an Instagram post on Tuesday: “My heart is breaking right now. The past few months I finally felt like me again. Cancer was no longer the first thing I thought of when I woke up. It was choreography, music choices, which dances in which order, what we needed to work on. I felt free again.
“My goal since hearing those words, ‘You have cancer’ was to get back on the Strictly dancefloor. It’s been such a challenge to get back, one I devoted 2024 to which, with my incredible team, we got there. Something I wanted to do for myself and loved ones.”
In February, she revealed that tests showed she had “no evidence of disease”, and later fronted a BBC show that delved into her condition.
She revealed last year how she was nearly killed by sepsis while undergoing treatment for the cancer. Dowden said she was “very unlucky” to have contracted the infection.
Dowden has also documented her Crohn’s disease in Strictly Amy: Crohn’s And Me, and said meeting others in a documentary had helped her “accept” her own condition for the “first time ever”.
Gill, 37, performed a Bruno Mars-inspired performance with Oakley on Saturday’s live show. The duo scored the joint highest of this year’s series for the performance.
