Alison Hammond shared a family news update on ITV’s This Morning today (Friday March 10).
Presenter Alison told viewers her niece is currently in hospital during a segment about the NHS.
The former Big Brother contestant was discussing with co-host Dermot O’Leary and guests Carol Vorderman and Nick Ferrari about trust in the health service.
But Alison made it clear her family’s experience has boosted her faith in the work that “amazing” NHS workers do.
Alison Hammond on This Morning
Telly fave Alison said: “I have to say, I have to caveat this, my little niece is in hospital at the moment.
“She is doing really well, by the way. I have been going back and forward.
“I definitely need to say that the NHS staff…. they have been absolutely amazing.”
Dermot reacted: “Extraordinary aren’t they?”
To which Alison replied, before giving her relative a shout out: “She has been treated absolutely amazingly. Hi Jasmine.”
According to reports, Jasmine was diagnosed with Kawasaki disease when she was three.
She was reportedly left fighting for her life after she collapsed at school nine years on.
Medics warned her relatives that Jasmine might need open-heart surgery as she struggled to walk and suffered from heart palpitations.
She also lost the use of her left arm and is believed to have suffered a heart attack.
“She was the sickest girl in the UK at that point,” Alison told the Mirror in 2012.
Jasmine was the sickest girl in the UK at that point.
“So she went straight to the top of the list to get a new heart.”
Jasmine later did indeed receive a transplant at the Birmingham Children’s Hospital – and Alison noted she had added her name to the organ donor list.
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This Morning airs on ITV, weekdays, from 10am.
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