Jeremy Clarkson feared he would ‘die alone’ over Christmas from Covid-19

Grand Tour presenter said experience of illness was ‘scary’

Ellie Harrison
Sunday 03 January 2021 13:59 GMT
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Jeremy Clarkson has revealed he feared he would die on his “own in a lonely plastic tent” of Covid-19 over Christmas.

The Grand Tour host wrote about his “scary” experience of the illness in his Sunday Times column, telling readers: “Four days before Christmas, I woke in the night to find my sheets were soggy. And that I had a constant dry cough."

He added that “because I am 60 and fat, and because I’ve smoked half a million cigarettes and had double pneumonia" he believed he would "probably die, on my own, in a lonely plastic tent".

On how he spent his time while self-isolating, Clarkson wrote: “I took myself off to bed with the new Don Winslow book and a bag of kale to wait for the Grim Reaper to pop his head round the door. I’m not going to lie – it was quite scary.”

In terms of his symptoms, Clarkson said his “breathing really did start to get laboured, and there was always the doctor’s warning ringing in my head about how it might suddenly get worse”.

Covid-19 cases in the UK were higher than 50,000 for the fifth consecutive day on Saturday (2 January).

In response to the figures, Boris Johnson said today (3 January) that while he expects life to start returning to normal by spring, he is “fully, fully reconciled to” the fact that lockdown restrictions might have to be toughened in the next few weeks.

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