Adventurer and television presenter Ben Fogle is being treated for a potentially fatal flesh-eating bug he picked up on a TV shoot, it emerged today.
The 34-year-old star has a hole about an inch wide on his right arm after a sore broke out following his return from the jungles of Peru. He now faces a month of treatment to stop the infection, which is believed to be leishmaniasis. The disease can kill if left untreated.
Doctors are testing some skin taken from the arm of the presenter, with the results in the next few days expected to confirm the presence of the bug.
Fogle would then have to have daily treatment where a compound is put into his bloodstream through a drip. The substance kills off the parasite but can make the patient ill.
The sore appeared in the wake of a mystery illness that left him bedridden for three weeks after returning from South America, where he was filming a new BBC adventure series ‘Extreme Dreams’.
Fogle, who lives in London with his wife Marina, said: "I have every confidence in the specialists treating me."
His spokeswoman said he was still planning to take part in the inaugural South Pole Race in December with Olympic gold medal-winning rower James Cracknell. The 370-mile race follows in the footsteps of Roald Amundsen and Captain Robert Scott and will see entrants pull sledges across the ice and snow to beat teams from across the world to the South Pole.
Fogle first appears on television in 2000 when he took part in the BBC's reality show ‘Castaway’. He has also appeared in other shows like ‘Countryfile’, ‘Crufts’ and ‘Cash In The Attic’.
Leishmaniasis is transmitted through the bite of a sandfly insect.
