Dr. Maya Angelou is doing very well....

TMZ reported an inaccurate statement (on October 3, 2009 at 11:20pm) claiming that Dr. Maya Angelou was taken to the hospital early Saturday evening, which was the reason why she could not attend the BraveHeart Awards at the Westin Hotel LAX. KSDK-Channel 5 in Dr. Angelou's home town of St. Louis, then reported that TMZ has claimed she been rushed to the hospital and had died. Officials at the BraveHeart Awards never made any claim to Dr. Angelou being sick in any way. Nor were they ever asked about why Angelou could not be present at the Award Ceremony.

She was being honored at the 2009 BraveHeart Awards as the recipient of the BraveHeart Courage Award and had sent her acceptance speech two weeks ago, because she had a previous commitment and could not attend. Dr. Angelou, along with other legends of our time receiving BraveHeart Awards included Carol Channing, (BraveHeart Arts Education Award,) Delta Burke, (BraveHeart Compassion Award),” and Courtney Cox presented the BraveHeart Business Concept Award to her best friend, Mary Fanaro. Other celebrity presenters included Marla Maples, Frances Fisher, Loni Anderson, Rolonda Watts, Les Brown, and Stefanie Powers.

"Dr. Maya Angelou is an American Treasure. It is extremely upsetting to me and to our entire organization that TMZ would make such erroneous statements. We believe this was irresponsible journalism and that TMZ should apologize to Dr. Maya Angelou as other media outlets around the country picked up on the negative story. BraveHeart Women is an online community that inspires & encourages women who want to make a positive difference in the world. We at BraveHeart Women are deeply saddened by this news which was disturbing and subsequently negatively affected Dr. Angelou and her family,” states Ellie Drake, founder of the BraveHeart Women Global Community.