Anorexia: Who is to blame?

Anorexia can be a devastating disease, not just for the sufferer, but also for the family and friends who have to watch a loved one in pain. Caroline Virr investigates a parent's viewpoint

American wit Dorothy Parker once claimed: 'It's impossible to be too rich or too thin.' But the recent, shocking pictures of Allegra Versace looking painfully thin, with a disproportionately large head and bones protruding through her skin, were enough to blow that theory out of the water.

Rumours had been circulating for months that the 20-year-old daughter of Donatella and her ex-husband Paul Beck was not well, but last month Allegra's parents issued an official statement.

It read: 'Our daughter, Allegra, has been battling anorexia, a very serious disease, for many years. She is receiving the best medical care possible to help overcome this illness and is responding well. As parents, we are doing out best to protect our daughter.'

This last sentence alone was enough to express the desperation and pain that both Donatella and Paul are feeling, and they are not alone. In the same month, Olivia Newton-John also revealed that her daughter, Chloe, had battled the disease. 'Maybe sometimes parents don't want to notice what's going on,' she said. 'As a parent, you want to think everything's okay. But all the therapists in the world can't help if the parents aren't present, loving and proactive.'

What is evident from these few, carefully-chosen quotes is that the parents of anorexia sufferers are all united by one thing: guilt.

No doubt the same heart-breaking pain was felt by the parents of Luisel Ramos, the 22-year-old Uruguayan model who died at a fashion show in August last year after suffering a fatal heart attack thought to be the result of anorexia. And the family of Ana Carolina Reston Mar-can, the Brazilian catwalk queen who died only three months later in a Sao Paulo hospital.

Ever since thinness was held up as the ideal, anorexia has rarely been out of the news but what are the exact causes of this potentially fatal disease?

The illness stems from an obsessive fear of gaining weight; voluntary starvation, often aided by vomiting and diet medicine, which can continue for years, destroying the constitution and causing osteoporosis in up to 50 per cent of cases, as well as weakening of the heart, immune dysfunction and low levels of essential hormones.

About one in 100 female adolescents are affected, and in 10 per cent of cases, the victim dies. Instead of watching their daughters blossom into confident young women, many parents become 24-hour carers as their offspring starve themselves to death.

It is easy to blame the fashion industry, given the trend for size zero models and digitally-enhanced images of celebrities splashed across magazines and newspapers every day. But scientists are beginning to cite genetic factors and parents of sufferers need no encouragement to blame themselves.