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Scientists thought Parkinson's was in our genes, but new findings challenge that: It could come from water

2025-12-15 19:15:32Lifestyle SHKRUAR NGA REDAKSIA VOX
Amy and Brad Lindberg

For 26 years, Amy Lindberg served in the U.S. Navy and walked with determination, as if every step had a purpose.

But around 2017, her right leg stopped “following orders.” Amy and her husband, Brad, had been retired for five years. After 10 military moves, they had bought their dream home near the North Carolina coast. Their backyard opened up to wetlands; birds could be seen hunting from the kitchen. They kept bees, played pickleball, and watched their children grow up.

But Amy's body rhythm was changing. She could no longer ignore the tremors. She began to confuse her words and thoughts, especially when she got excited. Was this normal? She was 57 years old, active, with a healthy lifestyle. Could it be menopause?

The diagnosis took five minutes. Parkinson's.

With all the classic symptoms.

A progressive, incurable neurological disease. Doctors couldn't tell him what had caused it.

Amy was the daughter of a sailor and had built her entire life around the military. She was commissioned as an officer in the US Navy right out of college. Her first assignment was at Camp Lejeune, North Carolina, a giant training center for over 60,000 sailors. Even then, rumors of "strange" cancers and stillbirths circulated, but Lejeune seemed like one of the most beautiful places the navy owned. The officers' quarters were located at Paradise Point, where the New River flows into the Atlantic.

“It was just picturesque,” ??Amy recalls. “The commute to work was half a mile. We had the river there and the beach nearby. No one would suspect the water.”

Parkinson's is the second most common neurological disease in the United States, after Alzheimer's. Each year, about 90,000 Americans are diagnosed. For decades, research has focused almost exclusively on genes, on the "mistakes" in DNA that are thought to cause the disease. Today, there are six times more studies on the genetics of Parkinson's than on other possible causes.

One reason is that some well-known figures, such as Google co-founder Sergey Brin, have a genetic link to Parkinson's. Michael J. Fox was also diagnosed early. His foundation has raised billions of dollars for research, and Brin has personally contributed about $1.8 billion. As a result, more than half of the funding for Parkinson's in the past 20 years has gone to genetics.

But there's a big problem. Parkinson's cases in the U.S. have doubled in the last 30 years and are projected to increase by 15–35% each decade. This is not typical behavior for a hereditary disease.

The latest studies show that only 10–15% of cases are fully explained by genetics. The rest remains a mystery.

“Over two-thirds of Parkinson’s patients have no clear genetic link,” says Briana De Miranda, a researcher at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. “So we’re moving on to the question of what else could it be?”

“The health you have today is a consequence of the environment you lived in yesterday,” says Ray Dorsey, a professor of neurology at the University of Rochester. The environment could be the refinery next door, lead paint in your childhood home, pesticides, air pollution, or the water you’ve been drinking for years.

If Parkinson's is an environmental disease, as Dorsey and a small group of researchers believe, then it could theoretically be prevented.

A turning point came in 1982, when a heroin user in California developed Parkinson's symptoms within a few days. The cause was a chemical, MPTP, that immediately destroyed dopamine-producing neurons. It was the first strong evidence that a chemical could cause Parkinson's.

Decades later, suspicions returned to Camp Lejeune. For over 35 years, the drinking water there had been contaminated with trichloroethylene (TCE), an industrial solvent widely used in the military and industry.

The US Navy denied the danger for years, but the statistics were shocking: a significant increase in cancers, serious illnesses, and infant deaths.

Epidemiologist Sam Goldman compared Marines at Lejeune with those at Camp Pendleton in California, where the water was cleaner. The result? Those who had served at Lejeune were 70% more likely to develop Parkinson's.

In the lab, Briana De Miranda took the research a step further, exposing mice to TCE for long periods. The results were clear: dopamine neurons were dying and the mice were showing movement and cognitive problems, just like Parkinson's.

In December 2024, the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) decided to ban the use of TCE in the US. But the debate continues, as politics often moves slower than science.

According to Dorsey, Parkinson's is part of a broader pandemic of chronic diseases caused by the environment. Only 5% of diseases are completely genetic.

“Genes load the gun,” Francis Collins, former director of the NIH, once said, “but environment pulls the trigger.”

Amy Lindberg continues to fight today.

She works out every day, playing pickleball, boxing, and using cardio equipment. Studies show that intense physical activity can slow the progression of the disease. Her environment may have caused her Parkinson's, but now, she's trying to use that same environment to fight back./ Taken from Wired


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