Despite what people thought may have been foul play, the famous blogger, YouTuber and relationship "expert" Kevin Samuels' cause of death was because of natural causes.
According to the medical report, Samuels died as a result of hypertension eliminating any possible suspicious circumstances surrounding the 57-year-old's death.
If you remember, we reported on Samuel's passing away on May 5, after Atlanta Police Department were called to a residence in response to "a person injured." When they arrived, the officers noticed first responders performing CPR on a man, who was unresponsive and lying on the floor of his apartment. A woman at the residence then identified the victim as the YouTuber.
The Fulton County Medical Examiner's Office released its findings into Samuels' death, telling TMZ.com that he died due to hypertension, more commonly known as high blood pressure. The medical examiner went to report, "Evidence of hypertension includes a heart whose chambers are thicker than normal."
The prevalence of high blood pressure among Black people in the United States is among the highest in the world.
One 2018 study in the Journal of the American Heart AssociationTrusted Source found that, of its participants, 75.5% of Black men and 75.7% of Black women developed hypertension by the age of 55 years. This compares with 54.5% of white men and 40% of white women.
Historical and systemic factors play a major role in these statistics. Among them are adverse social determinants of health, the conditions in which a person is born and lives. The determinants include lack of access to care, lack of access to healthy foods and other societal issues.
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According to one 2014 article in the American Journal of Medical ScienceTrusted Source, on average, a 45-year-old African American man who lives in the southeastern U.S. has the same risk of having a stroke as a 55-year-old white man living in the same region or a 65-year-old white man living in the Midwest.
Some say Samuels "looked healthy" and wonder how he could have hypertension. Factors that lead to hypertension include:
Medical racism: Several studies have documented a pattern of racism against Black people seeking healthcare, showing that doctors may not listen to their concerns, may delay treatment, or may not recommend appropriate treatment. One 2019 detected rampant bias in a medical decision making software program.
Lifestyle risk factors: A number of lifestyle factors — including eating a high salt, high fat diet, having a lack of access to quality food, and getting little exercise — can increase the risk of hypertension. Socioeconomic factors, such as housing disparities and other inequities based on systemic racism, may increase African American people’s exposure to these risk factors.
Racism: Chronic exposure to racism is associated with hypertension. A 2014 systematic review found that perceived exposure to racism correlated with an increase in the risk of developing high blood pressure.
Resistant hypertension: African American people are more likely to have resistant hypertension, which occurs when blood pressure does not drop in response to medication. Researchers do not know why this is, so they need to do more research on this topic.
Earlier hypertension: Black Americans develop high blood pressure earlier in life than people in other racial groups do. In fact, one 2019 study found that 31% of Black adults aged 18–44 years had hypertension.
Lack of access to medication, and distrust of health care professionals based on historical discrimination, are among contributing factors to a lower adherence to blood pressure medications.
Certain medications also may be less effective in controlling HBP in some Black people, and they may require two or more medications to achieve their BP goal.
It appears Samuels was also taking a medication called Atenolol, because the ME notes in their findings that the medication is used to treat hypertension.
Samuels's death is classified as due to natural causes.
