The 2023 genomic study did not resolve the question.
Axel Schmidt, a geneticist at the Institute of Human Genetics at University Hospital Bonn and a study coauthor, stated that “a clear genetic underpinning for Beethoven’s hearing loss could not be identified.” He also noted that this negative finding does not rule out a genetic cause; it means that none of the currently catalogued genetic variants associated with hearing loss appeared prominently in Beethoven’s genome. Future reference databases may contain variants that are relevant to his case but were not yet characterized at the time of the study.
The gastrointestinal problems that plagued Beethoven throughout his life—the abdominal pain, the diarrhea, the digestive complaints that appear repeatedly in his letters and in the accounts of people who knew him—also resisted genetic explanation. The study found that several conditions that have been proposed as explanations, including celiac disease (sensitivity to gluten) and lactose intolerance, are highly unlikely based on the genomic data. Beethoven’s genome actually showed some genetic markers associated with a reduced risk of irritable bowel syndrome, making that diagnosis less likely as well.
What caused his decades of digestive suffering remains unknown. The researchers could exclude several specific genetic explanations, but they could not identify the actual cause, and the historical record does not contain enough clinical detail to determine it from the other direction.
—
## The Heiligenstadt Testament in Full Context
The letter Beethoven wrote in Heiligenstadt in October 1802 deserves more than a passing mention, because it is the most direct window into his experience of losing his hearing and because its language has taken on new significance in the context of the 2023 study.