A recent Lancet article has resuscitated some interest about the influence of ABO blood groups and one’s chances of developing coronary atherosclerosis. Like a lot of earlier studies that documented the influence of blood group phenotypic influences on disease incidence, the researchers went in looking for one correlation and wound up finding another; and possibly produced an oversimplification in the rationale of their results.

Known to the Dutch as the “Hongerwinter,” the winter of 1944-45 saw the birth of almost 40,000 babies, each of whose vital statistics, such as name, birth date, and weight, were duly recorded by the Dutch authorities. In the 1960’s researchers began to study these now fully-grown famine survivors, and the results were shocking.