Augusto Odone, inventor of 'Lorenzo's Oil', dies at 80

25 October 2013 - 15:21 By Sapa-AP
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Adrenoleukodystrophy, and MRI showing T2 weighted axial scan at the level of the caudate heads demonstrates marked loss of posterior white matter, with reduced volume and increased signal intensity.
Adrenoleukodystrophy, and MRI showing T2 weighted axial scan at the level of the caudate heads demonstrates marked loss of posterior white matter, with reduced volume and increased signal intensity.
Image: Frank Gaillard

Augusto Odone, a former World Bank economist who invented a treatment to save his child's life, has died in his native Italy. He was 80.

His daughter Cristina Odone says her father died Thursday after suffering organ failure precipitated by a lung infection.

Odone's battle to help his son Lorenzo was depicted in a 1992 movie, "Lorenzo's Oil," with Nick Nolte playing the elder Odone.

Lorenzo was diagnosed with adrenoleukodystrophy, a neurological disease, when he was 6. Doctors predicted he would die in childhood. But Augusto and his wife Michaela relentlessly sought treatment.

Augusto Odone taught himself enough science to formulate a concoction derived from natural cooking oils for Lorenzo. Studies later suggested the oil appears to delay symptoms.

Lorenzo died in 2008 at age 30.

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