Lead likely did NOT cause Beethoven's deafness or more

That's contra friend Skeptophilia, who posts to that end, with link to a Smithsonian piece, that in turn riffs off a letter to the editor in Clinical Chemistry.

There's a LOT to unpack.

First, Beethoven's hair has been tested before. Contra what I infer the letter writers implying, this is nothing new.

Second, the lead acetate mentioned in the story? Goes back to Roman times. So does lead being in pottery glazes. So does lead-pipe plumbing. Was Caesar deaf? Cicero? Augustus? Seneca? I think not.

Third, the authors note they were able to sequence much of Beethoven's genome and that he had a genetic disposition toward liver disease and had hepatitis B at the time of his death.

You know what exacerbates liver disease? Alcohol, as in the alcohol that contained the lead acetate grape syrup Beethoven was drinking.

A History Channel piece goes further down that road, talking about this hair study, which was published in Current Biology:

Moreover, the researchers provided the first proof that Beethoven was infected with the hepatitis B virus, which inflames the liver and could have spread to him during childbirth, sexual intercourse, or surgery with contaminated instruments.

“If you have hepatitis B today, then your doctor is going to tell you not to drink a single glass of wine,” says Meredith, a co-author on the paper.

Yet, though most evidence suggests Beethoven was a moderate drinker for the era, “it’s safe to assume he was drinking practically daily,” says Tristan Begg, a biological anthropologist at the University of Cambridge in England and the paper’s lead author. In all likelihood, the researchers say some combination of alcohol consumption, hepatitis B, and his genetic predisposition to liver disease caused cirrhosis, from which he never recovered.

There you are.

If that's not enough?

Even an old ScientificAmerican story mentions a mix of alcohol and viral hepatitis on his death. (Beethoven also appeared to have had late-life pancreatitis, often associated with alcohol abuse.) From that 2023 hair study, again. In addition, Ars Technica notes Beethoven contracted typhus in 1796.

As for the deafness?

Beethoven had no genetic predisposition there. And, lead poisoning can be a factor. But, again, see above. And, some types of typhus can be a cause.

Not the first time Skeptophilia has run with something without being on the firmest of foundations. Why, this time, other than the "tears" on his piece meaning this has more pathos than Beethoven's drinking problem and wherever he got Hep B from, I don't know.

As for the letter he cites? When this was all over the news a year ago saying that lead probably was NOT the issue. It seems you have a couple of people hitting "publish" on the publish-or-perish button.

Now, how did Beethoven get Hep B? On causes, I doubt he was sharing dirty needles, and it surely wasn't from birth. That leaves him most likely visiting an infected prostitute. Boo hoo on that one, Skeptophilia.