Kate Garraway has said her husband, Derek Draper, remains "very damaged" as his health battle continues.
The political advisor has been in and out of hospital after catching covid in March 2020. He caught the virus over two years ago, but has been incredibly poorly since, with the virus having caused damage to his organs.
He spent months in hospital before being released home, but he was rushed back into hospital a couple of times for treatment. Kate had to take time off work to be by her husband's side, MirrorOnline reports.
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Speaking about Derek in a new episode of ITV documentary, DNA Journey, which aired on Thursday, she said: "2020 was a devastating year. With Derek, he got very sick very early on in the pandemic and has remained very damaged. That is quite well documented because for a lot of people, he's come to symbolise the fight that goes on."
Kate also praised Alison Hammond - who she appears on the show alongside - for being such a support to her.
She said: "Alison, she was messaging me to say she was thinking of me in that way."
Horrifyingly, Derek had to be rushed back to hospital earlier this year after a battle with sepsis.
Speaking on her return to Good Morning Britain, Kate said: "I dramatically disappeared and haven’t been here for three weeks now… We were on air and Derek had come out of hospital, he’s been going in and out of hospital for a while for looking at ways to tackle the damage caused by covid back in 2020. But we haven’t really had any sort of medical eruptions, and then he just was really unwell.
"So it was really dramatic; brilliant work by the A&E, absolutely extraordinary because when you’ve got sepsis, the big challenge is to find the source of infection quickly and get the right antibiotics and his blood pressure was so low."
Derek was also back in hospital a few weeks after to have an operation on his kidneys. At the time, doctors reassured Kate that his procedure is routine, and that there "was no alternative but to operate".
*DNA Journey with Kate Garraway and Alison Hammond aired on ITV at 9pm on Thursday.
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