Yet another Cambodian horror story of a British backpacker trapped in Cambodia. The original problem is said to have occurred in 2018, but the British man has never completely recovered, and is now reaching out to his family in the UK to help him come home. From the Daily Mail:

British backpacker is left with flesh hanging from his leg after a SPIDER BITE caused horrific reaction in Cambodia


Andrew Hodges, 56, was on a working holiday in Cambodia when he was bitten
He said his leg swelled up to twice its usual size and flesh began peeling off of it
Hodges collapsed in the street and was taken to a hospital by a kind passerby
Doctors at the hospital wanted to amputate his leg so he escaped one morning
He self-prescribed himself antibiotics and the wounds eventually healed
Now he is stranded in Cambodia and has racked up debts due to medicine costs

By Ryan Fahey For Mailonline
Published: 12:24 BST, 25 August 2020 | Updated: 12:38 BST, 25 August 2020

A British backpacker was left with flesh hanging from his leg after being bitten by a spider in Cambodia.

Andrew Hodges, 56, was working in restaurants in the South East Asian country when he was nipped on his leg by a spider. He was just three weeks into the working holiday when he was bitten in the middle of the night.

Hodges suffered horrible leg injuries which saw his limb swell to twice its size - and even caused him to hallucinate and collapse.

He woke up in hospital and said doctors there initially wanted to cut his leg off.

Hodges can be seen in Cambodia as his body battles the effects of the spider bite. He said the poison even caused him to hallucinate and collapse

Hodges said he was bitten in 2018 but the injuries caused such horrific problems he has been unable to travel home.

Hodges, of Woking Surrey, said he's also now stuck and unable to travel home because of the pandemic.

He said: 'I 'suspect it was a spider bite although I have no recollection of it happening.

'I was acting very strange according to a next door neighbour, and my knee on my right leg was apparently twice the size.

'It wasn't until I collapsed in the street when a passer by found me and offered to take me to hospital.

'I was left on a trolley with no medicine.

'I later received two drips and was laid on a mat on the floor to receive treatment, which is where I became conscious again.

'I was given one injection a day, and after the fourth day, I was informed they were going to cut my leg off.

'I wasn't very happy with that idea, especially as I had no information of what happened or anything else.' He later decided to escape the hospital in the early hours of the morning - with his leg severely damaged.

He said: 'I got a tuk-tuk, got back to the apartment I was renting, and basically had to treat myself.'

Hodges said he managed to get hold of antibiotics along with various other medicine which he found through an internet search.

Hodges said it took around eight months for his leg to heal, using over the counter antibiotics, and there is still scarring from the wounds.

He said: 'It took about eight months for it to heal, even though it's not healed now, the bottom part of the ankle, because the leg exploded in three places - one under the knee, one on the bite, one on the bone of the ankle.'.

Hodge's savings have been flushed away from paying for eight months worth of medicine.

He is also in debt from not paying his £200 a month visa due to not being able to walk to immigration.

'I'm stranded anyway because you can't get out of the country because of lockdown' he said.

'Even if I could fly, the main reason is the total costs here from what I paid in medical bills and eight months of medicines, all the money I had saved up slowly has drained away.'

He added: 'The spider bite destroyed my whole life as I knew it and now I am reduced to poverty and will soon be on the streets of Cambodia.'

Hodges is hoping his brothers or other family in Woking will get in touch to help him.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/articl ... bodia.html

The words (numbers) 56 and back-packer seem incongruous. How much is 8 month’s worth of antibiotics, assuming four doses a day??

A working holiday in Cambodia? Didn't know you could do that, I thought it would be one or the other. And what sort of visa costs £200 a month? If it's all true I feel sorry for the poor old sadpacker, but like his leg the story is full of holes.

lagrange wrote: ↑Tue Aug 25, 2020 11:51 pm A working holiday in Cambodia? Didn't know you could do that, I thought it would be one or the other. And what sort of visa costs £200 a month? If it's all true I feel sorry for the poor old sadpacker, but like his leg the story is full of holes.

I think the reference of $200 a month was more related to overstay than monthly visa. Even then, it’s still wrong. The question is was he on overstay before the flights stopped? And if it was a working holiday, which visa did he actually have? Like you, I think there are more holes than a Swiss cheese. More pertinent is that the story is in the Daily Mail. He’ll not get any sympathy from that publication’s readership

Yerg wrote: ↑Wed Aug 26, 2020 12:23 am

lagrange wrote: ↑Tue Aug 25, 2020 11:51 pm A working holiday in Cambodia? Didn't know you could do that, I thought it would be one or the other. And what sort of visa costs £200 a month? If it's all true I feel sorry for the poor old sadpacker, but like his leg the story is full of holes.

I think the reference of $200 a month was more related to overstay than monthly visa. Even then, it’s still wrong. The question is was he on overstay before the flights stopped? And if it was a working holiday, which visa did he actually have? Like you, I think there are more holes than a Swiss cheese. More pertinent is that the story is in the Daily Mail. He’ll not get any sympathy from that publication’s readership

Yerg, do you have a link to the story in the Daily Mail?
I think there will be more storys to come.

I’m guessing it had to be some type of snake bite to cause that much damage.

Could have been MSRA which is commonly misdiagnosed as a spider bite by patients and by doctors who are not trained well enough to diagnose it.

AndyKK wrote: ↑Wed Aug 26, 2020 1:14 am

Yerg wrote: ↑Wed Aug 26, 2020 12:23 am

lagrange wrote: ↑Tue Aug 25, 2020 11:51 pm A working holiday in Cambodia? Didn't know you could do that, I thought it would be one or the other. And what sort of visa costs £200 a month? If it's all true I feel sorry for the poor old sadpacker, but like his leg the story is full of holes.

I think the reference of $200 a month was more related to overstay than monthly visa. Even then, it’s still wrong. The question is was he on overstay before the flights stopped? And if it was a working holiday, which visa did he actually have? Like you, I think there are more holes than a Swiss cheese. More pertinent is that the story is in the Daily Mail. He’ll not get any sympathy from that publication’s readership

Yerg, do you have a link to the story in the Daily Mail?
I think there will be more storys to come.

From the OP “From the Daily Mail:”. I haven’t looked for it myself. That would be a waste of time and energy. It reeks of BS and half-truths. I don’t see the onerous bill for antibiotics being even remotely true.

Johno35 wrote: ↑Wed Aug 26, 2020 2:30 am Could have been MSRA which is commonly misdiagnosed as a spider bite by patients and by doctors who are not trained well enough to diagnose it.

A simply infected cut to the skin could have caused this. I still don’t buy the onerous antibiotics bill. It’s cheap as chips over the counter.