Former Champ Dead Of Pulmonary Edema

Edwin Rosario, a former lightweight champion whose career was marred by cocaine, died of acute pulmonary edema that could have been caused by drug or alcohol abuse, a pathologist said Tuesday.

Rosario, 34, died Monday night at his parents’ home in Toa Baja, a San Juan suburb. A police investigator suggested that Rosario may have died of a drug overdose.

In a pulmonary edema, the lungs fill with fluid, causing them to swell. It can cause heart failure.

Rosario’s lungs were “full of water,” Yocasta Brugal, director of Puerto Rico’s Institute of Forensic Medicine, said after an autopsy Tuesday. “He was out of oxygen and he died.”

“The death could be from intoxication from alcohol or narcotics use, but we won’t be certain what happened until toxicology tests arrive” in two or three weeks, she said.

Police quoted Rosario’s father as saying that his son was foaming at the mouth shortly before he died - another sign of an edema, Brugal said. His mother, Isabel, told reporters her son looked drunk when he returned home from a brief outing Monday evening.