A former firefighter had to fight for his life after what he thought was a “bad cold” turned out to be a carnivorous insect that “chewed” on his buttocks “like a shark.”
Simon English, 55, spent three months in intensive care where he “nearly died” and eventually had to undergo a procedure to install a stoma to allow his wound to heal.
“It feels like a shark bit my ass,” said English, a retired firefighter from Beverly, Yorkshire.
‘I ended up looking like I was about 70 after being in bed for weeks.
“My nurse told me that if I had left it longer before going to the hospital, I wouldn’t be here now.”
Mr English’s ordeal began in late March, when he developed all the classic symptoms of a cold.
His wife, Kay, works at a school and “always gets sick,” so the couple assumed her illness was nothing out of the ordinary.
But as the hours passed, his symptoms – fever, cough and fatigue – worsened.
Simon English spent three months in ICU while doctors treated him for a life-threatening infection that started in his butt.
Necrotizing fasciitis is thought to affect between 500 and 1,000 people each year in the UK, and around one in five patients die from the infection.
The next day, he knew “something wasn’t right” and went to the hospital.
“The next two weeks are a blur,” he said, admitting that he doesn’t remember much about what happened next.
‘They gave me a lot of morphine, I had many hallucinations. And then when I regained consciousness two weeks later, a doctor told me I had a disease called necrotizing fasciitis.
Necrotizing fasciitis, also known as “flesh-eating disease,” is a rare and life-threatening infection that begins in a wound.
It progresses rapidly after being triggered by several types of bacteria, including group A streptococci and staphylococci.
Occasionally, the bacteria can be life-threatening if it enters parts of the body such as the blood, muscles, or lungs.
Symptoms include small red lumps or bumps on the skin, bruising that spreads rapidly, sweating, chills, fever, and nausea.
Organ failure and sepsis are also common complications.
Mr English was fitted with a colostomy bag, in which one end of the colon is diverted through an opening in the abdomen. The waste products are then collected in a bag attached to the opening.
Sick people must be treated immediately to avoid death, and are usually given powerful antibiotics and surgery to remove dead tissue.
The mortality rate from the infection is high, and English said his doctor told him that one in five patients does not survive.
While in the hospital, he was rushed into emergency surgery to remove the infection in his left buttock, which had started with a small cut that he hadn’t even noticed.
“I had four operations,” he said. “They bandaged (the wound) and sent me back to the ICU.”
About four or five days after he regained consciousness, he was sent for a skin graft on his buttock, with skin taken from his right leg.
His body rejected the first graft, but the second “stuck” and he began a two-month rehabilitation period in the hospital.
“I had to walk around the hospital with a walker,” he said. “I was in the hospital for another two months to allow the wound to heal.”
The infection was so severe that doctors recommended an emergency colostomy to allow the wound to heal properly.
Mr English is still waiting to hear when the revocation procedure will take place.
After being discharged from the hospital in June, the retiree is slowly returning to his “normal” life.
He hopes to return to work as a volunteer gardener very soon.
“Other than my stoma, I’m completely healed,” he said.
‘My wound has completely healed, although it looks a little strange, due to my skin graft.
‘The surgeon said that of all the places to get it, you’d want it on your buttock so it’s out of sight.
“I’ve started doing some small maintenance jobs here and there and would like to go back to being a part-time gardener.”