Student Lucy Slawson started seeing a rash on her feet and arms after she was bitten by a mosquito while holidying in Antalya, Turkey, but thought feeling swollen was just down to scoffing ice cream
A student who blamed her swelling on scoffing too many holiday ice creams was stunned to discover it was caused by a mosquito bite that left her paralysed for a month.
Lucy Slawson noticed a rash on her feet and arms after being bitten by what she believes was a mosquito on her foot and felt ‘very’ swollen on the third day of her holiday in Antalya, Turkey. As the 21-year-old had never been abroad before she brushed her symptoms off, including body swelling, as sunburn and overindulging at meal times during her week-long trip – particularly on ice cream.
The international business management student, who claims she tripled in size while abroad, flew back to the UK without problem but while driving home said she started to lose her vision. Believing she was simply tired from her 5am flight, Lucy pulled into a hotel in Sheffield and checked in to rest.
But when she woke up four hours later her rash was burning and her legs had turned blue, so she went to a nearby pharmacy who urged her to call 999. Lucy was blue-lighted to hospital where her condition deteriorated and she slipped into a semi-comatose state for a week.
When she woke up she had lost all functions and spent a month in hospital relearning how to talk and walk with a frame. Doctors diagnosed Lucy with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome and Functional Neurological Disorder and believed this to have been triggered by an immune response to the bug bite.
Lucy, from Market Rasen, Lincolnshire, said: “When we were there [in Turkey] the first two or three days were completely fine. Then my whole body started getting a rash everywhere, mainly on my feet and then it was swelling. It was really red so I thought ‘oh I’ve just got sunburn’. I was very swollen. I had literally tripled in size that holiday.
“I thought ‘damn I’ve gained so much weight on this holiday’. It’s comical because if I was to look back now the swelling alone would have been one red flag. But because it was the first time I’d ever been abroad, I thought maybe my body had just not adjusted as well. I was eating a bit more than usual, treating myself on holiday. They had these Mars bars ice-creams and I was like, ‘do you know what? I love these’.”
When she returned to the UK from her holiday in July 2023, Lucy felt unwell and visited a chemist who advised her to call for an ambulance. Lucy was rushed to Northern General Hospital in Sheffield, before being transferred to Royal Hallamshire Hospital in Sheffield where she slipped into a semi-comatose state.
Lucy said: “The doctors and nurses knew I was declining but they didn’t know why. It got worse and worse and worse to the point where my legs were actually going blue. My body basically shut down because it didn’t know how to fight the infection. When I woke up I had lost all my functions.
“I became unresponsive, I was breathing on my own but I was unconscious. They could not get me to wake up no matter how much they tried. It’s on my notes that my first response to waking up was, ‘what about my Snapchat streaks?’ I had a 2,000 day snapchat streak and that takes commitment. I remember feeling so heavy and exhausted and I was getting annoyed because they wouldn’t let me out of bed because I couldn’t walk or use my arms or anything. Their [the doctor’s] best guess was that it was because of a bug bite.”
A week before going on holiday, Lucy visited her GP with cold-like symptoms and says she later learned she tested positive for Strep A, which is believed to have weakened her immune system. Lucy, who lost her driving licence and had to stop work, now experiences non-epileptic seizures and still struggles to walk long distances. The illness also caused Lucy’s bladder to stop working properly, so she had to have an op to insert a catheter in September 2024.
Lucy said: “The theory that this had come from a mosquito bite was spoken about from the start because of the rash I had that started on my feet. You could see what appeared to be small bite marks, but they couldn’t tell me what type of bug or what type of infection. It turns out I had strep A, it had basically damaged my immune system. My life has never ever been the same. I’m sick of not being able to go up and down stairs and do all these simple things that everyone else can do.
“I lost my license which was the biggest gut-wrenching thing ever because I had put myself through my driving lessons and bought my own car. I’ve spent the last year-and-a-half building up my walking so now I can walk around the block. I have a full-time care team that come and work 12 hours a day every day. I’ve seen small improvements. I previously did pole dancing before I got ill and I recently started that again.”
Strep A is a common type of bacteria and most infections are mild and easily treated. Common symptoms include flu-like symptoms, sore throat, rash, scabs and sores, pain and swelling, severe muscle aches, nausea and vomiting.
