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A rogue
gene is killing a third of the members of one extended family – and more could
die suddenly until tests are developed to identify it.
Neil
Halliday made the grim discovery while researching his family tree.
Tracing
three generations across the globe, the father of two noticed that too many of
them – nearly a third – had died suddenly while young.
He
discovered they were victims of a deadly but unidentified gene that can kill
without warning.
Scientists
refer to the disorder as Sudden Death Syndrome, but the family refers to it as
“Gorry’s Curse” – after the maiden name of Mr Halliday’s mother.
Her line carries the gene.
Sudden
Death Syndrome is an umbrella term used for the many different causes of cardiac
arrest in young people. These conditions include thickening or abnormal
structure of the heart muscle and irregularities of the electrical impulses that
upset the natural rhythm of the heart.
Children and
young adults are most at risk. They
can suddenly collapse or die during moments of emotion, stress, excitement or
physical exercise.
Mr Halliday,
46, said:” There is a serial killer out there on the loose.
The victims are generally children.
We don’t know who the next victim will be.”
Many genetic code faults could cause sudden death, so the Gorrys must
find the one that affects them.
Once the
carrier is identified, beta-blocker drug therapy – just one pill a day – can
be prescribed, saving countless lives.
One of four
children brought up in the village of Cwm, North Wales, Mr Halliday lost his
mother, a sister and a brother when he was young.
“My eldest
sister, Yvonne, died when she was 21,” he said.
“My brother Kevin died at 16 and my mother Phyllis died when she was
30. Al were healthy young people
wiped out without warning.”
The
premature deaths were attributed to vague and differing causes, including
epilepsy, blood clots and heart failure
Mr Halliday
became a policeman before emigrating to Bermuda where he trained as a lawyer.
Returning to Britain last April to continue his search for relatives he
discovered that eight of his mother’s 15 siblings had died, six of them
suddenly and mysteriously while young.
He tracked
down his mothers youngest sister, Michelle Gorry, now 56. She remembered attending as a youngster, the funerals of six
of her brothers and sisters. “A death would occur in the Gorry family every
year. We’d hear local people
talking about a curse on the Gorrys. It
was quite frightening. We wondered
which one of us would be next.” She said.
One of
Michelle Gorry’s children, her son Kevin, an excellent swimmer, died at 14
while swimming in the sea.
When Mr
Halliday told his aunt how his teenage brother had also died while swimming, the
pair became certain the deaths were more than just coincidence.
They
determined to warn the rest of the family, scattered among countries including
Canada, Germany and Australia.
Ms Gory
tracked down the family who had adopted her firstborn son, whom she had when she
was 16. They lived 30 miles from
her home town in North Wales. She
was told that he had died 29 years ago – suddenly, at the age of 11.
Now Mr
Halliday and his wife Suzie are always on the look out for signs of the disorder
in their own children, ten-year-old William and nine-year-old Christina.
Mrs Halliday said: “We have to keep a constant vigil.”
Although Mr
Halliday and his children have no obvious signs of the disorder, the shadow of
the rogue gene will remain over them until it can be identified and kept at bay.
There are constant reminders. Mr
Halliday’s sister Anwen, who lives in Perth, Australia, passed the gene on to
her 17-year-old daughter Anne-Marie, who died in a nightclub while dancing in
1988.
Mr Halliday
said: “My mission is to tell all my distant relatives to be on the alert, to
know what to look out for, to ensure that they do not die needlessly.”
The story of
the Gorry Curse will be shown as the first episode of a series, Bitter
Inheritance, on BBC2, 10th January, at 9.50pm.
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