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Did Heath die of natural causes?

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Heath Ledger

US reports today suggest that Heath Ledger’s tragic death may not have been caused by an overdose, but by natural causes.

TMZ, the celebrity website that broke the news of the actor’s death last Tuesday, quoted sources ‘intimately connected with the investigation’ as saying the star may have had a heart attack.

‘It's now appearing that the level of toxicity (from medication) in Ledger's system was low enough that it may not have caused his death. These sources say Heath's heart stopped,’ the website reported.

Initial tests on Heath’s body were inconclusive, but friends and family have insisted he would not have taken his own life.

Indeed, in an article published yesterday, Sarah Lyall, who conducted the last interview with Ledger last November, said he ‘did not seem depressed, or suicidal, or whacked out from drugs’, when they talked. ‘What he seemed was exhausted,’ she told the Observer. ‘It looked to me like the sort of fatigue you get not from being tired of life, but from being too full of it - too full of plans, too full of self-analysis, too full of noisy thoughts that won't stay quiet.’

Meanwhile, US fans will pay tribute to the Brokeback Mountain star next week at a public memorial service in Los Angeles. Australia's foreign minister Stephen Smith gave no details of the remembrance ceremony in California but confirmed a private service had been held in New York on Saturday, where members of Ledger's family joined the actor's ex-fiancée Michelle Williams and their daughter Matilda to pay their respects.

The casket then began its two-day journey to the actor's hometown of Perth, Australia, where Ledger will be laid to rest at a family funeral next week.