Boxing legend Muhammad Ali passes away
Boxing legend Muhammad Ali, who was hospitalised following respiratory problems on Thursday, passed away on Saturday.
“After a 32-year battle with Parkinson’s disease, Muhammad Ali has passed away at the age of 74,” his spokesman Bob Gunnell said.
Ali, whose fame transcended sport during a remarkable heavyweight boxing career that spanned three decades, had been hospitalised in the Phoenix, Arizona, area with a respiratory ailment this week.
Ali had been hospitalised several times in recent years, most recently in early 2015 when he was treated for a severe urinary tract infection initially diagnosed as pneumonia.
His last formal public appearance before that was in October when he appeared at the Sports Illustrated Tribute to Muhammad Ali at The Muhammad Ali Center in his hometown of Louisville, Kentucky, along with former opponents George Foreman and Larry Holmes.
Ali has suffered from Parkinson’s for three decades, most famously trembling badly while lighting the Olympic torch in 1996 in Atlanta.
Despite the disease, he kept up a busy appearance schedule until recently, though he has not communicated verbally in public for years.
An iconic figure who was at one point arguably the most recognised person in the world, Ali lived quietly in the Phoenix area with his fourth wife, Lonnie, who he married in 1986.
