Angelina Jolie (right) and her mother Marcheline Bertrand pose together at the premiere of Jolie’s film Original Sin in Hollywood on July 31, 2001. Photo: AP

Actress Angelina Jolie’s aunt has died from breast cancer, less than two weeks after the star had a double mastectomy to avoid the disease.

Debbie Martin, 61, died in a San Diego, California-area hospital, her husband Ron said yesterday.

Martin was the younger sister of Jolie’s mother Marcheline Bertrand, whose own death from cancer in 2007 inspired the surgery that Jolie described in a May 14 New York Times article.

The Oscar-winning film star said she hoped her story would inspire other women fighting the life-threatening disease.

Jolie, 37, is raising a family with fellow actor and fiancé Brad Pitt. She wrote that she went through with the operation in part to reassure her six children that she would not die young from cancer, as her own mother did.

Martin had the same defective BRCA1 gene as Jolie, but did not know it until after her 2004 cancer diagnosis

“We often speak of ‘Mommy’s mommy,’ and I find myself trying to explain the illness that took her away from us. They have asked if the same could happen to me,” wrote Jolie.

“I have always told them not to worry, but the truth is I carry a ‘faulty’ gene.”

Martin had the same defective BRCA1 gene as Jolie, but did not know it until after her 2004 cancer diagnosis.

Her husband said had his wife known in advance of her genetic risk, “she would have done exactly what Angelina did”.

Martin’s death was first reported by E! News.

After getting breast cancer, Martin had her ovaries removed preventively because she was also at very high genetic risk for ovarian cancer, which has killed several women in her family.

Jolie, who won an Oscar as best supporting actress for her 1999 role in the film Girl, Interrupted, said her doctors estimated that she had a 50 per cent risk of getting ovarian cancer but an 87 per cent risk of breast cancer.

She had her breasts removed first, reducing her likelihood to a mere five per cent.

She described the three-step surgical process in detail “because I hope that other women can benefit from my experience”.

The story, a surprise to most save those closest to Jolie, spurred a broad discussion of genetic testing and pre-emptive surgery.