Brit teen told mum ‘I'm sorry, goodbye' before collapsing in her arms during fatal allergic reaction on dream hols
Lily King, 18, from Buckinghamshire, tragically died after eating a carrot in a meal to celebrate top grades in her first year at Exeter University while on holiday in Morocco.
7
7
The student was diagnosed with severe allergies to fish and seafood, nuts, sesame, milk and eggs when she was two-and-a-half – and her mum Aicha had packed a whole suitcase of safe supplies.
While Lily's childhood had been dominated her allergies - along with eczema and asthma - she hadn't ever needed hospital treatment until five months prior to the holiday.
She had bought a burger at a music festival in Exeter and suffered anaphylaxis – the most extreme allergic reaction, where rapid swelling in the throat and tongue cause breathing difficulties and sometimes cardiac arrest.
Then, on the last night of their holiday last year, Lily discovered that she had received a first for her first-year exams and wanted to celebrate - so the pair decided to go out for a meal.
It was somewhere they had eaten before, including for Lily's 18th, and they were confident that it would pass without hitch.
Upon arrival, Aicha, who is Moroccan and speaks Arabic, gave staff repeated clear instructions about her daughter's allergies.
Lily herself even said in Arabic: "I don't want to be killed," Aicha told the Mail.
But when the food arrived, it came with vegetables and a sauce they hadn't asked for.
Lily put a small piece of carrot into her mouth, saying: "Don't be silly mum, it's just a carrot," but her tongue instantly felt itchy.
She took an antihistamine and went to the bathroom, then used her EpiPen and went outside for some air.
Megan McKenna blasted the Prime Minister today for 'abandoning' a vow to create an 'allergies tsar'
After just 15 minutes, Lily was struggling to breathe. She used her second EpiPen and Aicha called an ambulance.
Now desperate, the mum ran back into the restaurant to grab her bag of money and passports but, agonisingly, the waiter wasted vital minutes by insisting she paid the bill.
When she got outside again, Lily was gasping for air and slipping out of consciousness.
According to the Daily Mail, she collapsed into her mum's arms and said: "You know Mum, I love you. I'm sorry. Goodbye."
With the ambulance nowhere to be seen, Lily's cousins bundled her into their car and rushed to the hospital – but she stopped breathing on the way.
7
7
7
Medics performed CPR but refused to begin further treatment until Lily's mum had written a check - further stalling the process.
The desperately ill teen was eventually put on life support - but with no brain activity doctors were forced to switch it off three days later.
It was found that she had already suffered a heart attack and a catatonic fit, which rendered her brain dead, before being hooked up to the machine.
Reflecting on the terrible ordeal, Aicha said: "Neither the waiter nor any of the doctors spoke English.
"Without Arabic, it would have been impossible to make myself understood.
"It is my mother tongue and yet I still couldn't get the care Lily needed."
A JustGiving page set up to raise funds for Natasha Allergy Research Foundation has racked up nearly £9,000 in donations.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
The Guardian
10 hours ago
- The Guardian
Girl left unwatched by agency worker at psychiatric unit was unlawfully killed, inquest finds
A vulnerable 14-year-old girl was unlawfully killed when an agency support worker failed to keep her under observation at a secure psychiatric unit, an inquest jury has concluded. The worker, who used a false identity, left Ruth Szymankiewicz alone even though she had complex mental health issues and was judged to need constant watching because she was a suicide risk. Ruth was able to slip back to her room and harmed herself at the privately run Huntercombe hospital near Taplow in Buckinghamshire on 12 February 2022. She died two days later. During the inquest it emerged that the worker, who went under the stolen identity Ebo Acheampong, had never worked at any hospital before the day he was put in charge of observing Ruth and did not receive an induction before his shift. The jury in Beaconsfield heard that the ward Ruth was on was habitually severely short-staffed and relied heavily on temporary agency staff like Acheampong. Ruth's parents, Kate and Mark Szymankiewicz, a GP and a consultant surgeon, claimed at the inquest that Ruth never received the therapeutic care she needed. They were devastated that the unit was more than 70 miles from their Wiltshire home, leaving Ruth isolated and desperate. The couple also expressed concern that Ruth had unfettered access to her mobile phone and was able to research suicide. Though Ruth died in 2022, health experts told the Guardian that many of the issues around the use of agency staff and the shortage of psychiatric intensive care units (PICUs) for children and young people was still a huge problem. Andrew Molodynski, a consultant psychiatrist at Oxford health NHS foundation trust, said there was a 'gap in accountability' over the training and vetting of agency staff. He said it was often mental health inpatient units, with the most high-risk individuals, that relied on agency staff the most, especially when they had patients like Ruth needing one-to-one supervision. He said this was a 'toxic catch-22 … You end up with very few people who know the ward and know the patients.' Minesh Patel, an associate director of policy and campaigns at the mental health charity Mind, said Ruth's case was 'a clearcut example of the many systemic issues in our mental health hospitals'. He said: 'An over-reliance on agency staff can compromise patient safety, quality of care, and in the worst cases lead to serious harm or loss of life.' During the inquest, Dr Gillian Combe, the clinical director for the provider group that commissioned Ruth's placement, said the understaffing seen at Huntercombe still existed. She expressed frustration at rules in England that make it hard for new NHS units to be built, meaning provider groups have to rely on sending patients to private units. Combe said this situation arose after Andrew Lansley's changes to the NHS – described by some as 'creeping privatisation' – when he was Tory health secretary from 2010 to 2012. She said there was no PICU for children and young people in the whole of south-west England. The charity Inquest, which has supported Ruth's family, expressed concern that the inquest focused on individual failings rather than systemic ones such as the lack of therapeutic care for children, inadequate staff training and out-of-area placements. It said: 'The focus has fallen on individual failures, not the deep-rooted issues plaguing Huntercombe and children's mental health services nationally. Until we face those head-on, more children like Ruth will die.' Ian Wade KC, an assistant coroner, said there had been an 'abject failure' by Acheampong to observe Ruth. Dr Amit Chatterjee, the chief medical officer at Active Care Group, which owned and ran Huntercombe, told the inquest that the company had worked hard to improve recruitment and its induction process. Huntercombe has closed but Chatterjee said the company had boosted therapeutic care at its current site for young people, Ivetsey Bank hospital in Staffordshire. The inquest heard that after learning that Ruth had died, Acheampong fled from the UK to Ghana. Thames Valley police said they knew his real identity but did not have enough evidence to try to get him back. The use of agency staff in mental health settings has been cited as a major issue in numerous reviews and inquest conclusions. In the case of Lily Lucas, a 28-year-old woman who died in 2022 from excessive fluid intake brought on by schizophrenia, an NHS review found that some agency nurses on her privately run ward did not know how to use 999. An inquest into the death of Sophie Alderman, 27, who took her own life at a mental health hospital in 2022, found there was a heavy reliance on agency staff, and only two qualified permanent mental health nurses were on the ward at the time. A Care Quality Commission report on the Mental Health Act said patients had described agency staff as 'not friendly' and 'less caring' towards patients, and detrimental to morale among permanent staff. In the UK, the youth suicide prevention charity Papyrus can be contacted on 0800 068 4141 or email pat@ and in the UK and Ireland Samaritans can be contacted on freephone 116 123, or email jo@ or jo@ In the US, the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline is at 988 or chat for support. You can also text HOME to 741741 to connect with a crisis text line counselor. In Australia, the crisis support service Lifeline is 13 11 14. Other international helplines can be found at
BBC News
15 hours ago
- BBC News
Inquest opens into Stoke-on-Trent Waterworld death of girl, 4
An inquest has opened into the death of a four-year-old girl who died in hospital following an incident at a water park in Vasu-Dharma, from Bradford in West Yorkshire, was found 'unresponsive and submerged in water' by a member of the public at Waterworld in Festival Park on 4 August, coroner Daniel Howe girl's place of death was listed as Royal Stoke University Hospital and the time of death was listed as 17:33 inquest was opened at Stoke Town Hall and adjourned to allow for more information to be gathered. In a statement released on its Facebook page last week, bosses at Waterworld said their thoughts were with the family and loved ones."We remain committed to supporting the community and would like to thank you all for your support," they said lifeguard and management teams performed CPR on the girl before emergency services visitors were asked to leave the pool during the rescue operation, a company spokesperson water park has since reopened. Stoke-on-Trent City Council said its environmental health team was working with the police and venue to "undertake a full health and safety investigation".Lord Mayor of Stoke-on-Trent Steve Watkins said: "We were all devastated to hear of the death of a four-year-old girl at Waterworld."This is a terrible tragedy and our thoughts are with her family and loved ones." Follow BBC Stoke & Staffordshire on BBC Sounds, Facebook, X and Instagram.
BBC News
19 hours ago
- BBC News
Calorie labels rarely influence choice, Reading Uni survey finds
Calorie labels on takeaway menus are unlikely to encourage people to choose healthier options, a survey has from the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine (LSHTM), University of Reading and University of Exeter surveyed 1,040 takeaway eaters about their found seven in 10 people did not notice calorie labels on online menus, and 71% of those who did said it did not influence their food co-author Dr Cherry Law, a food economist at the University of Reading, said it proved that calorie information alone was "not enough" to improve people's eating habits. As part of a government strategy to encourage healthier eating, calorie labelling was mandated from April 2022 for large out of home businesses across research, which was published in BMJ Nutrition Prevention & Health, surveyed 1,040 adults in England who had reported buying takeaways at least once in the past 12 with restrictive dietary requirements, such as vegetarian or vegan, were excluded from the survey. 'Systemic issues' It found that taste and price were ranked the most important factors when deciding which takeaway to order, while healthiness and carbon footprint were ranked as least 50% of respondents agreed or strongly agreed that alternative interventions, such as traffic light labels and more healthy alternatives on the menus, would encourage them to make a healthier author Associate Professor Laura Cornelsen said the food industry needed to offer affordable meals that met nutrition guidelines."The focus should be on tackling systemic issues, like making it simpler and more affordable to purchase healthier options, rather than adding even more pressure to consumers and families to change their choices," she said. You can follow BBC Berkshire on Facebook, X (Twitter), or Instagram.
