In the beginning, celebrities use drugs (prescribed medicine or illegal drugs) cope with stress, relieve physical pain, and to mask symptoms of mental health disorders like depression and anxiety but within no time it becomes an addiction which sometimes costs the life of the addict. In this post, we are going list down the celebrities who lost their life due to drugs overdose.
Amy Winehouse
Amy Winehouse was one of the most talented English singer-songwriter to Hollywood. She was born on 14th September 1983 in north London, to Jewish parents. Winehouse’s, at age 19, she recorded her debut, Frank, a jazz-tinged album that became a hit and earned her several award nominations. Her 2006’s album ‘Back on Black’ was an international hit, and ‘Rehab’ made No. 9 on the US pop charts. The year 2008 was a big turning point of her career when she bagged five Grammy Awards on the same night (February 10th, 2008). Amy Winehouse died at the age of 27, on 23 July 2011, in her London home due to drugs overdose.
Heath Ledger
Heath Ledger was an Australian actor and director, born on the fourth of April 1979, in Perth, Western Australia. His first real acting job came in a low-budget movie called Blackrock but he didn’t have a large role in the move. Then he accepted a role in T.V. series Sweat (1996), in which he played a gay cyclist. He did is film debut in the Australian film Blackrock and later starred in the teen comedy 10 Things I Hate About You
Ledger received “Best Actor of 2005″ awards from both the New York Film Critics Circle and the San Francisco Film Critics Circle for his performance in Brokeback Mountain, in which he plays Wyoming ranch hand Ennis Del Mar, who has a love affair with aspiring rodeo rider Jack Twist, played by Jake Gyllenhaal.
According to the Interview given to New York Times, published on 4 November 2007, Ledger told Sarah Lyall that his recently completed roles in I’m Not There (2007) and The Dark Knight (2008) had taken a toll on his ability to sleep: “Last week I probably slept an average of two hours a night. … I couldn’t stop thinking. My body was exhausted, and my mind was still going.” At that time, he told Lyall that he had taken two Ambien pills, after taking just one had not sufficed, and those left him in “a stupor, only to wake up an hour later, his mind still racing.”
Heath Ledger died on 22 January 2008 and Two weeks later on 6 February 2008, the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner of New York declared that he died of an accidental overdose of prescription drugs that included pain-killers, sleeping pills, and anti-anxiety medication. After his death, he received more than thirty posthumous awards for his portrayal as the psychopathic clown prince of crime in The Dark Knight.
Whitney Houston
Whitney Elizabeth Houston was born into a musical family on 9 August 1963, in Newark, New Jersey, In 2009, the Guinness World Records cited her as the most awarded female ( Two Emmy Awards, six Grammy Awards, 30 Billboard Music Awards, 22 American Music Awards, among a total of 415 career awards as of 2010) artist of all time. She was one of the world’s best-selling music artists, having sold over 200 million records worldwide.
She began singing in the choir at her church, The New Hope Baptist Church in Newark, as a young child and by the age of 15 was singing backing vocals professionally with her mother on Chaka Khan’s 1978 hit, ‘I’m Every Woman’. Her debut album, ‘Whitney Houston’, was released in 1985 and became the biggest-selling album by a debut artist.
She was found dead in a Beverly Hills hotel room bathtub on 11 February 2012.
Elvis Presley
Elvis Presley was an American singer, musician, and actor who was born on January 8, 1935 in East Tupelo, Mississippi. he is often referred to as “the King of Rock and Roll”, or simply, “the King”. He began his music career in 1954, when he started to work with Sam Phillips, the owner of Sun Records. In November 1956, he made his film debut in Love Me Tender.
Presley is one of the most celebrated musicians of the 20th century. Throughout his career, he set records for concert attendance, television ratings and recordings sales. He is one of the best-selling (with estimated album sales of around 600 million units worldwide) and most influential artists in the history of popular music. His death at age 42 on August 16, 1977 shocked his fans worldwide.
Anna Nicole Smith
Anna Nicole Smith was born on November 28, 1967 in Houston, Texas, USA as Vickie Lynn Hogan. Smith first gained popularity by winning the 1993 Playmate of the Year. She modeled for clothing companies, including Guess jeans and Lane Bryant.
On February 8, 2007, Smith was found dead in room 607 at the Seminole Hard Rock Hotel and Casino in Hollywood, Florida.
There are many other celebrities also died due to drugs overdose and complete list can be found here