Kate Garraway’s husband Derek Draper plummeted 8 stone as Covid shut down organs

Kate Garraway’s husband Derek Draper has plummeted a jaw-dropping eight stone since being rushed to hospital on March 29 with coronavirus.

The former Labour lobbyist – who doctors told Kate was the sickest patient they had ever treated who has managed to survive this long – has been through organ shutdown, lung and kidney failure and now struggles to digest food since Covid-19 rampaged through his body.

While he no longer has the disease, the damage it has caused has been extensive and doctors don’t know when – or even if – he’ll be able to fully recover.

Speaking about how she’s been trying to hold up the fort at home for their two children – Darcey, 14, and 11-year-old Billy – Kate told You magazine : “We hope and believe he will come out of it, but we just don’t know. The heart of the family has been ripped out and we don’t know if we will ever get it back.”

She went on: “At first it was all about Derek’s lungs, but then his kidneys started failing and he was on dialysis. Now they’ve realised Covid can affect every cell of the body: most recently Derek’s been having problems with his intestines.

“The absorption of food and vomiting are problems and they’re trying to work out whether that’s because his cells don’t produce the enzymes to digest. His liver and heart and blood vessels have been affected.”

Kate, who has now returned to work at Good Morning Britain, said she’s been “consumed with fear” throughout Derek’s illness but has to pull herself together for the kids.

“Children don’t choose when they’re going to be upset; you say: ‘It’s 9pm, I’m going to bed, I’ve got to be up at 2am for work,’ and that’s when they suddenly want to talk about Dad, so of course you just have to say, ‘OK, let’s talk about it’,” she pointed out.

Cruelly, the couple were due to renew their vows on their wedding anniversary this Thursday, after Derek re-proposed when Kate came out of the I’m A Celebrity jungle last December.

Instead, she’ll be juggling her work commitments with getting the kids back to school, phone calls with Derek’s hospital team and the never-ending legal queries when dealing with a sick spouse.

“I felt I saw everything in a new light [after the jungle],” Kate went on.

“I’d always known family and friends and love were the most important thing, but after the jungle that brought it into focus even more. Darcey was very excited: she was planning a second wedding – God knows what she’d have had me wearing. But now that won’t be happening and our anniversary will be very strange.”

And while Derek has now emerged from his deep coma, he’s still only minimally conscious and the kids haven’t been able to see him in person for almost six months, although Kate is able to visit him in hospital.

When she saw him for the first time over a video call, she was shocked at his appearance.

“When I finally got to FaceTime him, seeing him unconscious was a big shock.

“He’s lost nearly eight stone in weight, a lot of it muscle throughout his body. He looked worn-out, thin and pale with dark circles under his eyes and there were lots of tubes.”

But, she added, neither her nor the doctors have given up on Derek yet.

“What you have to keep thinking is there were so many moments when doctors thought we’d lost Derek or were about to, and he’s still here. There is still hope.”