Shaky vampire theory

Press, 10 July 1985, Page 20

Shaky vampire theory

NZPA-AP New York The theory that vampire legends stem from a rare inherited disease marked by sensitivity to sunlight and garlic is not supported by evidence, says the director of an organisation representing people with the disease. “As far as patients are concerned, this is just exploitation,” said Desiree Dodson, executive director of the American Porphyria Foundation in Montgomery, Alabama. In May, David Dolphin, a chemist at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, attracted extensive publicity when he said the people who gave rise to vampire legends in the Middle Ages might have been victims of a rare form of porphyria, a genetic illness caused by disruptions

in the complex chemical reactions needed to produce a blood component called heme, a constituent of hemoglobin.

Dr Karl Anderson, of New York Medical College in Valhalla, who has treated many people with porphyria and is allied with the foundation, disputed that claim. Dr Anderson said the rare disease called congenital erythropoietic porphyria could not have given rise to vampire stories because no one in the Middle Ages knew that its victims had a blood deficiency. The victims do not develop a thirst for blood. After David Dolphin described his theory in Los Angeles at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, Mrs Dodson said she was bar-

raged with telephone calls from incensed patients throughout the United States. “Any other stigma that adds to their already low self-esteem is a detrimental factor,” said Mrs Dodson, who has acute intermittent porphyria, a more common form of the disease. Dr Anderson said that some 5,000 Americans might suffer from porphyria, of which there are at least six types. The rare form discussed by Mr Dolphin has been seen in only 60 people in the world, he said. Mrs Dodson said that while people with some forms of the disease require transfusions of blood products, those with other forms would be harmed by such transfusions. Mr Dolphin’s theory might mislead some doctors unfamiliar with porphyria into pres-

cribing the wrong treatment for patients, she said. Mr Dolphin, commenting on Mrs Dodson’s criticism, said that some Middle Ages victims of the disease might have found out they needed blood by whatever means, by feeling the need in the same way that animals know to seek a salt lick when they require salt. Porphyria has had a chequered history. George 111, may have suffered from it, and one account claims that the illness was responsible for his approval of the Stamp Act, a contributing cause of the American Revolution. In the mid-19605, congenital erythropoietic porphyria was linked to the werewolf legends, because it can cause excessive growth of hair and disfigurement of the face and hands.