Renowned sex therapist and talk show host Dr. Ruth Westheimer, who spoke frequently about sex and intimate topics, died Friday at the age of 96.
Her spokesman confirmed her death to BBC News and CBS News without specifying the cause.
Ruth Westheimer, commonly known as Dr. Ruth, is known for speaking openly about sex, becoming a pop culture icon as well as a best-selling author of how-to books like “Sex for Dummies.”
She promotes open communication about sex in a non-judgmental manner.
Dr. Ruth, who speaks with a German accent, is a Holocaust survivor and was born in Frankfurt, Germany.
In the 1980s, she had her own local radio show called “Sexually Speaking”, which became widely known and catapulted her to national fame when it was broadcast nationally in 1984.
She wrote her first book, Dr Ruth’s Guide to Good Sex, in 1983, in which she sought to decode sex. It was the first of more than 40 books she would go on to write.
Dr. Ruth launched a television show the following year called The Dr. Ruth Show and wrote a nationally syndicated advice column.
“I know there is a lot of knowledge out there that is not reaching young people,” said Dr Ruth. NBC Nightly News 2019.
Dr. Ruth regularly appears on talk shows such as The Howard Stern Radio Show, Dr. Oz Show, Nightline, Tonight Show and Late Night with David Letterman.
Last November, New York Governor Kathy Hochul announced that Dr. Ruth would become the state’s honorary ambassador for loneliness.
“I am deeply honored and have promised the governor that I will work day and night to help New Yorkers feel less alone!” Dr. Ruth said at the time.
Born Karola Ruth Siegel in 1928, she was sent to Switzerland by her parents at the age of ten to escape Kristallnacht, a violent riot inflicted by the Nazis on Jews before the Holocaust.
Dr. Ruth never saw her parents again after leaving Switzerland and believes they were killed in the gas chambers at Auschwitz – the Nazi death camp.
