Death Seed The Death Seed plague was a disease caused by parasitic droch s which caused necrosis of the skin and ultimately led to death . Cause and clinical features . The Death Seed was caused by drochs , which could steal life force energy from its host . If allowed to remain attached , the droch burrowed into its host began to mimic the host ' s electrochemical fields and tissue composition , allowing it to avoid detection by essentially becoming part of the host while drawing life from them . Drochs grew and became more intelligent with each host they killed , and larger drochs could absorb life through smaller ones , without having to take a host directly . Victims would display no perceptible ailment – no virus , no bacteria , no poison and no allergy – just the rapid decay of the skin as the plague took hold . With the drochs able to escape detection while in a host , the cause remained unknown . Bacta therapy only accelerated the disease , because the healing provided a renewed source of energy for the droch . Victims could die within half an hour after displaying initial symptoms . History . First pandemic . An outbreak of Death Seed happened seven centuries BBY and , proved virtually unstoppable . When it occurred on a spaceship , the whole crew was condemned to death since it moved on so quickly that there was no way to escape it . Details of the pandemic remain sketchy , however it is known that huge sections of the population of dozens of worlds were killed before the plague burned itself out . Supreme Chancellor Anwis Eddicus had a role in ending the outbreak . The final death toll was estimated in the billions . In 702 BBY the Grissmath Dynasty founded a penal colony on Nam Chorios in Meridian sector and seeded the world with drochs in the hopes that a Death Seed outbreak would wipe out the prisoners . However , sunlight fragmented through the sentient Spook crystals found on Nam Chorios weakened the electrochemical bonds of the drochs . Smaller ones were killed outright by the light , while larger ones proved unable to harm their hosts and were harmlessly absorbed into the blood . A plague never broke out and drochs were only able to grow in the dark . Minor scare on Tatooine . In 1 ABY , the Imperial Department for Epidemic Prevention discovered that some wild creatures were possibly carrying droch eggs . Such creatures were all destroyed to prevent a new epidemic . Second pandemic . In 13 ABY , Seti Ashgad , working with a genetically altered droch called Dzym , started a second pandemic in an effort to weaken New Republic forces and enable Moff Getelles to take control of Meridian sector . Dzym could control the other drochs , giving him the ability to coordinate the plague , both infecting and curing victims . The plague needed to be carried in living tissue , infected synthdroid s provided by Loronar Corporation were used to carry the disease off Nam Chorios and begin infecting personnel at New Republic facilities . Ashgad promised that only New Republic personnel would be affected and persuaded his co - conspirators that the plague was unconnected with the Death Seed of centuries ago . When Dzym commanded the drochs to start , the plague broke out simultaneously across the sector . On her way to a diplomatic mission , Leia Organa Solo was taken hostage by Ashgad when the whole crew of her ship died of the Death Seed plague . The infected Leia was taken hostage by Ashgad who made Leia ' s ship jump into hyperspace blindly . She was later cured of the disease by Dzym , and may be the first known person to recover from the Death Seed . The plague quickly spread through New Republic bases eventually spreading across three quarters of the sector . Amongst those affected were the base on Nim Drovis , the orbital base at Durren , most of the population of Cybloc XII and the entire crews of the New Republic ships " Borealis " and " Adamantine " . All efforts to control the plague proved futile . The plague eventually came to an end when Luke Skywalker persuaded the Spook crystals to be taken to other worlds to help cure the infected . Dzym and Ashgad were killed while attempting to leave Nam Chorios .