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King Tut died from sickle-cell disease, not malaria: Experts | King Tutankhamun's death was a result of sickle-cell disease, and not malaria - according to experts.
A team from Hamburg's Bernhard Noct Institute for Tropical Medicine (BNI) claims
that King Tut suffered from Kohler's disease - a bone disorder prohibiting blood
flow, before succumbing to malaria. Despite segments of a malarial parasite found
via DNA testing and multiple bone disorders in the left foot being diagnosed as
Kohler's disease, the BNI team claims that the combination of malaria with Kohler's
seems unlikely. Instead they feel that sickle-cell disease (SCD), a genetic blood
disorder, is a more likely reason for the Pharaoh's death aged just 19. "The genetic
predisposition for (SCD) can be found in regions where malaria frequently occurs,
including ancient and modern Egypt," The Independent quoted Prof Christian Meyer
as saying. "The disease can only manifest itself when a sickle cell trait is inherited
from both parents: it is a so-called 'recessive inheritance'," he adds. The high
likelihood that King Tut's parents were siblings means he could have inherited
the sickle cell trait from both and suffered from SCD. On the other hand, old
age of his parents and relatives - up to 50 years - means they could very well
have carried sickle-cell traits, and could therefore have been highly resistant
to malaria. The find is published in the Journal of the American Medical Association. |
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