A friend of Jamie Dornan revealed the actor was hospitalised after coming into contact with a dangerous caterpillar on a golf course last year. Photo / Getty Images
A friend of Jamie Dornan revealed the actor was hospitalised after coming into contact with a dangerous caterpillar on a golf course last year. Photo / Getty Images
Jamie Dornan was hospitalised after coming into contact with a dangerous caterpillar in Portugal last year, a friend has revealed.
The Fifty Shades of Grey actor, 41, required emergency treatment after brushing up against the toxic hairs of processionary caterpillars while on a golf course.
Dornan’s friend, the presenter Gordon Smart, who also needed hospital treatment for the same symptoms on the trip, said he “found himself in hospital in Portugal thinking I was having a heart attack” and that the pair were “very lucky to come out of it alive”.
Speaking to the BBC’s The Good, the Bad and the Unexpected series, the broadcaster and radio host said: “It turns out that there are caterpillars on golf courses in the south of Portugal that have been killing people’s dogs and giving men in their 40s heart attacks.
“And it turns out we’d brushed up against hairy processionary caterpillars and had been very lucky to come out of that one alive.”
Dornan and his friend brushed up against hairy processionary caterpillars on their trip. Photo / Getty Images
Recounting the tale to host Mark Nelson, he explained: “We had a great time, first day loads of golf, went out, lots of wine, was drunk, then we got on to espresso martinis.
“The next day we played golf…and I started to feel tingling in my left hand, and then tingling in my left arm…which is normally the sign of the start of a heart attack.”
He was sent to hospital for treatment after recording an abnormally high heart rate at a local medical centre and while there saw Dornan being rushed into the emergency room.
He said: “As I was lying there, one of the other lads I was with went past on a hospital bed with doctors shouting the same questions to him, and I thought that’s not a good sign if he’s in the same state as me… it was a pretty scary time, to be honest.”
Smart, 43, said that he had “collapsed” in his Uber ride from the medical centre to the hospital, before waking up in a bed attached to a machine.
Smart was sent to the hospital for treatment and while there saw Dornan being rushed into the emergency room. Photo / AP
The radio host explained that it was only after he had been released from care and was back at the holiday home that he saw the Belfast actor again, who revealed that he had suffered a similar reaction to his friend.
“I got out of hospital, got back to the house, and my mate turned up back and his name happens to be Jamie Dornan, Hollywood star,” he said.
“And there he was with all this stuff attached to his chest saying: ‘Dear me Gordon, about 20 minutes after you left my left arm went numb, my left leg went numb, my right leg went numb and I found myself in the back of an ambulance’.”
It was only when a doctor phoned them the following week that they discovered the true cause of their emergency room visits.
Contact with the small barbed hairs on the caterpillars, which are common in Southern Europe, can cause reactions in people ranging from mild inflammation to severe anaphylactic shock.
Smart said the doctor asked: “Espresso martinis aside, at any stage did you come in contact with caterpillars on the golf course?”
Smart also revealed that the paramedics had asked Dornan for a selfie after dispatching him from care, a request which the star of the hit BBC show The Tourist had obliged, despite being in a difficult state.
Smart is an award-winning Scottish broadcaster and journalist and is the former editor of the Scottish Sun. He presents the late-night show on BBC Radio 5 Live on weeknights and has a Sunday evening show.
He was a main anchor on ITV’s Good Morning Britain for a short stint at the end of 2022 before he joined the BBC. He also co-hosts The Restless Natives podcast alongside Martin Compston, his friend and Line of Duty star.
Representatives for Dornan have been approached by The Telegraph for comment.
