Coronavirus: Linda Lusardi says COVID-19 made her want to die and turned her vomit blue

Linda Lusardi says there were moments her coronavirus symptoms were so bad she prayed she wouldn’t wake up.

The former Page 3 girl spent 10 days in hospital with a fever, chronic chest pains and vomiting after testing positive for COVID-19.

Describing her symptoms to The Sun, Lusardi said: “I started to get a fever, [I was] feeling rough and carried on, but it got worse and worse.

“Your head hurts, your brain hurts and you feel like an elephant is sitting on you.

“I remember crawling to the bathroom, putting my face on the tile floor and then almost trying to make myself sick to just get a light relief for five minutes afterwards.

“I was leaning over the edge of the bed, coughing and spitting into a bucket. Your vomit is blue.”

The 61-year-old star and her husband showbiz agent Sam Kane both became ill at home before being diagnosed with the virus.

They believe Kane first caught it while at a business meeting before passing it on to Lusardi.

Lusardi says the days they spent at home before going into hospital were the worst: “It got to the stage where both of us were praying we wouldn’t wake up because it was so bad.”

Kane said his symptoms felt “like the devil’s hands were strangling me”.

When the couple became seriously ill, their children Jack, 20, and Lucy, 24, called 999 and both were taken to North Middlesex hospital in the same ambulance.

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While Kane’s symptoms improved after several days, Lusardi’s condition worsened.

Describing his wife as being “at death’s door”, Kane says doctors warned him she might not pull through.

Lusardi says it was thinking of her children that helped her fight her illness, gradually becoming stronger and finally leaving hospital.

Lusardi is now recovering at her home in North London, but says she still has moments of breathlessness and tiredness.

Thanking the NHS for “saving their lives”, she says she has been “humbled” by the outpouring of affection for her on social media and urged people to take the virus seriously.

She also paid tribute to comedian Eddie Large who died aged 78 with coronavirus, calling his death “devastating”.

Lusardi found fame as a model in the 1970s and 1980s and in 2005 was voted the UK’s most popular Page 3 girl ever.

She has since appeared on Emmerdale, Loose Women and Dancing On Ice.

(c) Sky News 2020: Coronavirus: Linda Lusardi says COVID-19 made her want to die and turned her vomit blue