Have a question? Call us on 0800 1979 345
Have a question? Call us on 0800 1979 345
This article was published on November 4th, 2015
A young couple have returned home from Sharm-el-Sheikh after spending half their holiday in bed with a severe gastric illness. The couple paid over £1,500 for an 11 day break at a supposed 5 star hotel and ended up hooked up to IV drips fixed to a lampshade.
The couple first became ill after 4 days when they decided to order burger and fries via room service. They said that they had seen flies and birds landing on the buffet food and on occasion it wasn’t hot but had not been too worried as they knew it was a five star hotel and trusted its hygiene record.
Within hours of eating the food in their room they both started to suffer stomach cramps followed by vomiting and severe diarrhoea. It became so bad that after a few days, a doctor was summoned and prescribed an IV drip to replace their fluids and prevent severe dehydration and antibiotics.
To make matters worse, the doctor failed to insert the IV drip properly and needed to ask another doctor to come and do the procedure leaving the woman’s arm badly bruised. They then used the hotel room’s lampshade as a makeshift IV holder!
They then spent the rest of their holiday in their rooms trying to recover and in fact they needed a number of weeks off work when they returned home to fully recuperate.
The woman said: ‘It was a holiday to relax and it just made us poorly.’
‘We’re still having effects from it now and the doctors have said we can’t eat any dairy products for six weeks as it would trigger it off again.
‘When we were away we didn’t eat anything from the Sunday when we got ill until the following Saturday night when we got home.
‘We just couldn’t keep anything down but everything was just going straight through or coming up. It was horrendous, absolutely horrendous.’
The man also commented: ‘We can’t put into words the ordeal we have been put through.
‘It was a truly terrifying experience. All we wanted to do was to get home and receive the treatment we needed but we felt completely helpless, trapped in a hotel room, not knowing exactly how serious our illnesses were.
‘The indignity of having to help each other to the toilet with IV fluids running through the cannulas, which were still in our arms and hands and attached to the lamp shades, along with the way that we were treated, has left us both physically and mentally exhausted.’
He added: ‘This was meant to be a break that we both deserved and we were expecting a relaxing and luxurious holiday.
‘We will be reluctant to go anywhere where we could go through such an experience again.’
The couple are seeking compensation against their tour operator.
Thorneycroft solicitors have many years of experience in helping clients claim compensation for holiday disaster’s abroad and have the necessary expertise to maximise the amount of compensation awarded in what can often be a very complex claims process.
We offer a free initial interview in order to review your specific circumstances and assess the viability of your personal injury claim.
To speak to one of our specialist team call us now on FREEPHONE 0800 1979 345, or complete our simple enquiry form and we can call you back at a time to suit you.
