A seven-year-old British boy suffered a stroke and is intensive care after falling ill during a holiday in Egypt.
Luay Mohammed also has sepsis and a collapsed lung after suspected salmonella poisoning, and has spent more than three weeks in intensive care at Birmingham Children’s Hospital where he remains in a critical but stable condition.
He fell ill at the five-star Tia Heights at Makadi Bay in Hurghada, which is around 15 miles from the resort where British couple John and Susan Cooper died last month.
Tests have identified a high level of e.coli and staphylococcus bacteria has been found at the Steigenberger Aqua Magic Hotel, where the Coopers died, though this does not establish the cause of their deaths. The food and hygiene tests did not detect the presence of shigella, listeria or salmonella.
Speaking to the Mirror from Birmingham Children’s Hospital, Luay’s mother Fathia Obayd said: “It was terrifying. I thought we were losing him… It makes me so angry that this all began with food poisoning.”
Luay, who has sickle cell anaemia, and his family travelled to the resort for a fortnight on 27 July. His symptoms worsened when they returned home to Balsall Heath, in Birmingham.
A spokesman for Tia Heights said: “During this period we have had almost 3,550 guests and we did not have one recorded or reported case of salmonella.”
Purple Travel, the firm the family says it used to book the holiday, refused to comment on the case directly due to GDPR restrictions, but told HuffPost UK: “Both ABTA and ourselves would advise any customer experiencing sickness whilst on holiday to seek medical assistance immediately. We provide all of our customers with the details of the local ground handling agents to contact in the event of such circumstances and we are also here to offer assistance ourselves, both whilst a customer is on holiday and when they return home.
“As a travel agent the safety and wellbeing of customers is our number one priority. We are very sorry to hear of Mrs Obayd’s son’s illness and wish him a full and speedy recovery.”