5 People You Never Knew Had Psoriasis

Celebrities and famous people of all kinds are always coming out in support of various groups, admitting that they suffer from X and Y. But few people in the public eye share with the world that they suffer from psoriasis. It still has a degree of social stigmatization attached to it that could be improved if influential people - actors, singers and performers - of all kinds were to admit that they have it, and they're not ashamed of having it. Here's a list of 5 famous (and infamous!) people who had psoriasis.

Joseph Stalin - 1878 - 1953

You have probably heard of Comrade Stalin. As the de facto ruler of the Soviet Union, he was responsible for pulling the Iron Curtain across Europe and creating a regime that killed a minimum of 10 million people - in work-camps called gulags, by using death squads nicknamed "Black Ravens", and other means.

His two major itches were the West and psoriasis, both of which he couldn't scratch. It was a source of great irritation to the dictator, who even had one Dr Kazakow executed after his controversial lysate treatment failed to work!

Would Papa Stalin have been such a homicidal maniac if his psoriasis went away?

Pablo Escobar - 1949 - 1993

This Colombian drug lord extraordinaire was responsible for a lot of white stuff. I'm not talking about his white, flaky scales here, but about cocaine.Pablo 'El Patr籀n' Escobarsmuggled tonnes of the powder into America every day, using everything from planes to 2 remote controlled submarines! Eventually he built up the Medell穩n Cartel into an empire, with his personal worth being $9 billion. Rumour has it that Escobar got into the drug trafficking business after someone told him to try out a few drug treatments for his psoriasis... just kidding.

Vladimir Nabokov - 1899 - 1977

Nabokov is a well-known Russian-American novelist and short-story writer who is responsible for classics such as Lolita and Pale Fire.

After a particularly bad outbreak of psoriasis, he wrote a tender confessional letter to his wife, saying ""the indescribable torments I endured in February drove me to the border of suicide-a border I was not authorised to cross because I had you in my luggage."

I, for one, am grateful that he did not make it across that border, because his luggage also contained work of unreplaceable literary value.

Ben Franklin - 1706 - 1790

Ever wondered why Ben Franklin wore that coonskin hat all the time? Maybe because he had scalp psoriasis! He was "The First American" with psoriasis, and probably the first one who kept a detailed journal of it, way back in the 1770s and 1780s. He was reported to have suffered particularly bad flare-ups when he was helping to draft the Declaration of Independence, which must have been difficult as it had spread to his hands. He wrote that "the disorder seems to be now increasing again, and appears upon my hands".

Byron Janis - 1928 -?

This legendary concert pianist never gave up on the piano, playing through the excruciating pain of psoriatic arthritis in his hands and wrists for decades. In fact, he is considered by many as one of the greatest pianists of the 20th century. He continues to play the piano even after having surgery that made his left thumb shorter, hampering his ability to reach the next octave easily! We can also thank him for unearthing manuscripts of two Chopin waltzes in France in 1967, both of which would have been lying around dusty right now had he caved in to the psoriasis.