How the Bengal Famine Changed South Asian Genes
New epigenetics research shows that British-induced starvation didn’t just kill millions — it rewired bodies for generations.
In 2018, Dr. Mubin Syed felt a strange twinge after a round of high-intensity interval training (HIIT). “I thought, well, maybe I’m just dehydrated because I’m not having intense chest pain or anything,” Syed told The Juggernaut.
But the feeling that something was terribly wrong wouldn’t go away. Syed called an ambulance. When he got to the hospital, a doctor told him he’d been having a heart attack. He was later diagnosed with high lipoprotein(a), an inherited condition that often affects South Asians — including those who identify as “healthy.” That’s when he started looking into something he hadn’t considered before: the legacy of British-imposed famines on South Asian bodies.
South Asians around the world are at higher risk of diabetes, metabolic disorders, and thyroid issues. For Bengalis — who endured the Bengal Famine of 1943 — those outcomes can be even worse, Syed noted. Today, scientists are reexamining the subcontinent’s history with a new lens — thanks to an emerging field called epigenetics. Exhausting all other explanations, they are daring to ask: just how much damage did forced starvation cause us, and is it possible to ever recover?