Allen Tough - Illness and Death

Illness and Death

In 2000, Allen Tough began exhibiting symptoms of Multiple System Atrophy, a degenerative neurological disorder initially misdiagnosed as Parkinson's Disease. In January 2008, at the age of 72, he said about his health: "I have always enjoyed walking and hiking, and enjoyed good health until recently. Then one day in the summer of 2000, while my wife Cathy and I were hiking in Kluane National Park in the Yukon, I had problems with balance and falling. At the time, I attributed it to fatigue. Now I know it was the first warning sign of a disease called Multiple System Atrophy, a rare degenerative disease related to Parkinson's. It occurs because of progressive cell loss in numerous sites in the central nervous system. Why this cell loss occurs is unknown. Because MSA causes postural instability and low blood pressure, I always use a walker. I continue to live a happy, busy, productive life. I feel cheerful and not at all sick. Cathy and I often enjoy walking in natural settings. Life is good!"

For the remainder of his life, Prof. Tough continued to make significant intellectual contributions to his three chosen fields of research: adult learning, futures studies, and the Search for ExtraTerrestrial Intelligence. During the last few days of his life, despite having lost the ability to communicate verbally, he was actively involved in the analysis of a still unverified SETI candidate detection. Allen Tough died of pneumonia on 27 April 2012, at the age of 76.