A medical history of Michael Jackson

Michael Jackson suffered a catalogue of serious illnesses which may have contributed to his premature death

Michael Jackson with an unidentified boy in 1993

Because Michael Jackson generally declined to discuss his illnesses, and appeared in public at various stages in a wheelchair, or wearing surgical masks, his health was a topic of constant speculation. There is little doubt he was beset by a range of problems which might have contributed to his death at the age of only 50.

DRUGSJackson sought solace in painkillers; he admitted using Valium, Xanax and Ativan. Around the time of his trial in 2005, Jackson was regularly taking morphine and Demerol, a synthetic drug similar to morphine. There were reports today that Jackson had received an injection of Demerol from his doctor less than an hour before he collapsed. He was apparently under stress, preparing for the London concerts. LUNG AND LIVER PROBLEMSBy 2008, Michael Jackson was in terrible shape and needed a lung transplant, according to Ian Halperin, a British biographer, because he was suffering from a genetic illness called alpha-1 antitrypsin deficiency, which affects the lungs and the liver. Though the claims were rebutted by Dr Tohme Tohme, the singer's spokesman, Halperin said that Jackson had bleeding intestines, was blind in his left eye, and was constantly so winded that he could barely talk. CANCER Jackson was due to start an ambitious series of 50 concerts at the O2 Arena in London this summer. But the first dates of his residency there were cancelled amid concerns about his health. This May, he was said to have had skin cancer tests, which revealed cancerous patches on his neck, and pre-cancerous patches on his face. This was denied by concert promoter, Randy Phillips, who said he was in "fantastic shape". VITILIGOMichael Jackson started his life black, and ended it white. The reason for this was not, as rumours suggested in the 1980s, that he bleached his skin. Instead, as he told Oprah Winfrey and 90 million American viewers in a rare TV interview in 1993, it was down to vitiligo, a disease which destroys pigment cells in the skin and leaves it covered in blotchy white patches. The medicine that Jackson took to combat vitiligo then made his skin even paler.

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is a London-based journalist. He has previously worked at News Review, a weekly in Santiago, and taught literature and history in Argentina.