Paul Young rushed into intensive care after horror fall on luxury Greek holiday
18 March 2025, 11:14 | Updated: 18 March 2025, 11:18
Eighties pop icon Paul young was rushed to intensive care and needed three blood transfusions after a horrific fall while on a luxury Greek holiday.
Listen to this article
Loading audio...
The singer, 69, recalled how he was on holiday with his wife Lorna, 53, In Santorini last year when he suffered the horrific fall.
Paul had been walking down the stairs to breakfast at the De Sol Hotel and Spa while it was pouring with rain when his leg slipped from under him and he heard a crack as it hit the step.
The star, whose hits included "Love of the Common People” and “Wherever I Lay My Hat”, suffered multiple leg fractures and underwent gruelling surgery to have a metal rod fitted.
But after his surgery, Paul began haemorrhaging and was taken to intensive care where he received three emergency blood transfusions.
He told The Mirror: "There was no handrail, so nothing to hold on to. I just thought, "I've lost control'."
“I fell and my leg cracked as soon as I hit the step,."Once I’d gone down, I couldn’t stop. There was no handrail, so nothing to hold on to. I just thought, ‘I’ve lost control.’”
Explaining his injuries further, Young explained that he fell down three or four steps, which caused him to fracture his leg “again and again”.
He continued: “It was a multi-fracture. When I came to a stop, I looked down and my leg was in a slightly weird position, underneath my bottom.
“I thought, ‘I don’t like that. My leg shouldn’t be like that’, so I tried to straighten it up and that’s when the pain started.”
His wife Lorna raised the alarm and Paul was rushed to Santorini General Hospital in Karterados - where x-rays showed multiple fractures to his left thigh bone.
The injuries were so severe that there was a “danger of the leg snapping”, according to Young.
A lack of surgeons at the hospital meant Young was sat on a gurney in the hospital corridor for nine hours while trying to organise a private flight to Athens.
He said: “The only medication they had was paracetamol. I was screaming out all the time and most of the time I had my eyes shut because the pain was terrible."
After undergoing surgery, Young was required to spend two days in intensive care due to haemorrhaging. He also needed three blood transfusions to replace the lost blood.
Two weeks later Paul was discharged from the Greek hospital and he flew back to the UK via private plane - 30,000 feet lower than commercial planes as he was anaemic and the high altitude could have increased his chance of suffering a life-threatening blood clot.
Now, nearly six months after the accident, Young is no longer using crutches and is undergoing physiotherapy and hydrotherapy to help with his recovery.
Preparing for his forthcoming national tour, the musician said he was now “fighting fit and ready”.
Young married his wife Lorna in October 2023, six years after his wife Stacey Smith died of brain cancer at 52 years old.
