Gemma Clare Collins (born 31 January 1981) is an English media personality and businesswoman. In 2011, she began appearing on the ITVBe reality series The Only Way Is Essex. Following a brief appearance on I'm a Celebrity...Get Me Out of Here! (2014), Collins has appeared in various television programmes including Celebrity Big Brother (2016), Celebs Go Dating (2018), and Dancing on Ice (2019). In 2019, she began starring in her own reality series and hosting a podcast on BBC Sounds.
Gemma Collins: 'I thought I was having a heart attack but it's long Covid'
Gemma Collins has looked to sub-zero cryotherapy in a bid to “shock her system” back to health after long Covid symptoms made her convinced she was dying of a heart attack.The 42-year-old reality star contracted the virus last year and she has been suffering from the side effects ever since.
Only last month, Gemma revealed she had to ring for an ambulance and thought she was going to die. “The palpitations got so bad I thought I was having a heart attack,” she says. “I called an ambulance and the paramedics did an ECG [electrocardiogram] and said, ‘We need to take you to hospital.’ “I said to myself, ‘Great, this is it.
My time is up.’ But, thank God, it was a condition called costochondritis, which can cause severe chest pain and happens because of coughing or an infection.
I think I got it from being constantly run down and ill. I do think I’ve got long Covid because I haven’t been able to shift it and it’s been in my system for months.
