On January 10, his family had posted at the Caring Bridge page about the cause's of Jared Stene's death: Wilson's Disease:
Wilson’s Disease is an extremely rare disorder that effects how the liver handles copper as it enters your body. Normally the liver passes copper into bile, which the body uses in digestion. In Jared’s case the liver did not pass copper, instead it stored it in his liver. As the copper builds up in the liver, it starts to injure the liver tissue. Over time, this damage to the liver causes the liver to release the copper directly into the bloodstream, where it begins to affect other organs.
This condition is hereditary; Jared was born with it. . . .
As a family, the news has been somewhat a comfort. The nagging questions that persisted as to what caused Jared to be taken from us have been somewhat answered. The questions of ‘what if’ that our family has been thinking about have been put to rest for now. The unfortunate part of this disease in Jared’s case was that once he started to present symptoms, his liver had already failed and resulted in fulminant liver failure. . .
There's an article about Jared in today's Star Tribune: Rare and undetected genetic disease killed Winona State student at age 22.
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