I think insect bit me, Peters tells Prime Minister

Winston Peters

Foreign Minister Winston Peters is in isolation in a Brisbane hospital after contracting what is believed to be a tropical illness in Malaysia.

Prime Minister Helen Clark says Mr Peters, who is 61, was "extremely unwell" when he arrived in Brisbane on Saturday and was admitted to hospital for tests.

He was on his way home from the Asean regional forum in Kuala Lumpur, and planned to watch the Bledisloe Cup rugby test in Brisbane.

Helen Clark said yesterday she spoke to Mr Peters on Sunday night.

He told her he believed he had been bitten by an insect while he was at a lunch in the Malaysian capital during the four-day visit.

"He recalls getting what he felt was a bite of some sort and he just didn't feel well," she said.

Doctors at Wesley Private Hospital in Brisbane do not have definitive results from the tests done on Mr Peters, but have told him he can expect to stay in hospital for a week.

Mr Peters was to have spent Saturday evening with Queensland Premier Peter Beattie watching the rugby in his corporate box.

Labour Party president Mike Williams said from Brisbane last night that he was in the box with the Premier when a call came through telling him Mr Peters couldn't be there as it was thought he had deep vein thrombosis and "was too crook to come".

Mr Peters' press secretary said he knew nothing about the possibility of thrombosis.

Helen Clark said: "I must say that when I spoke to him he was quite cheerful, so he was obviously being kept comfortable, but he had not been at all well."

Wesley Hospital refused to comment yesterday, citing patient confidentiality.

Auckland medical travel specialist Dr Marc Shaw said if Mr Peters had been bitten and had a tropical disease, it was most likely to be dengue fever, particularly as it was the rainy season in Malaysia.

It was otherwise known as "breakbone fever" because it made the limbs excruciatingly painful to bend.

Other symptoms included rashes, nausea, lethargy, tiredness and sometimes bleeding.

"It's probably the worst kind of flu you can ever get," Dr Shaw said.

The disease was unlikely to last longer than 10 days to two weeks in adults getting it for the first time, and was highly unlikely to be fatal.

The New Zealand High Commission in Kuala Lumpur refused to comment yesterday, other than to say it had seen no reports in local media of other Asean participants becoming unwell.