A woman who said she was 'scared' of getting vaccinated is now begging people to get the Covid-19 jab after suffering eight cardiac arrests in hospital.
Gemma Roberts, 35, spent two months on a ventilator after being admitted to hospital with coronavirus in August.
Doctors had to restart her heart a total of eight times, including four times in a single day, as she fought Covid-19 and two bouts of sepsis.
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At one point her heart stopped beating for 10 minutes, her partner told the Mirror.
Gemma, from Warrington, says she sorely regrets refusing the coronavirus vaccine before she fell ill and now thinks "everyone should have it".
"I was one of those people that was scared of having the jab. I heard it had killed people," she said.
"I took a chance and I almost didn't pull through. Medical professionals saved my life, that's who I will listen to now."
Gemma's ordeal began when she was rushed to Warrington Hospital shortly after testing positive for Covid-19.
"At first I thought it was just a hangover as I had been at a wedding the weekend before. But then I tested positive," Gemma said.
"I was feeling tired and sick at the beginning and then I started to feel out of breath when I went to the toilet.
"When they said they were taking me into hospital I thought they would give me a bit of oxygen and let me out again.
"I've got no underlying health conditions and it is the first time I've been in hospital."
The former Eddie Stobart worker, who was due to start a new job when she fell ill, said she begged doctors at the hospital not to let her die and recalled ringing her partner Sophie Holmes to tell her she was going to be put to sleep.
Gemma said she reassured her partner of one year she was going to be okay, but admitted: "there were moments when I thought 'I could be a goner here'".
Support worker Sophie, 39, said Gemma was admitted to hospital and put on a CPAP machine after she rang 111 about her condition on August 11.
Two days later, she was told Gemma would be put to sleep as her oxygen wasn't good enough.
"That's when everything went crazy," Sophie recalled.
"On the 14th she had a cardiac arrest. Her heart stopped and she required CPR and resuscitation.
"They brought her back. A week later she had another one and was brought back again. She then had a couple of days before the next one.
"On August 31 she had four cardiac arrests. She had been ventilated for three weeks by that point. She had one more cardiac arrest after that.
"The longest period she was dead for was 10 minutes. Each time the doctors performed CPR and brought her back to me, I couldn't ask for more."
Sophie, who proposed to Gemma a few days after she woke up, said they were both unvaccinated and neither she nor her partner had any underlying health conditions.
"We are just a bit chubby - that's it," she said. "The doctors saved her life."
Sophie added: "I want people to know not to believe the anti-vaxxer rubbish. We were brainwashed."
Gemma was finally taken off her ventilator at the start of October.
She was initially unable to move her arms and legs, but following physio she is now able to walk with a zimmer frame and hopes to be discharged from hospital soon.
Gemma said she is eternally grateful to one of her nurses, Collette Thomas, who told her throughout that she was going to survive.
"She said it from the start. I knew in my head she couldn't make that promise but it comforted me at the time," Gemma said.
