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Reggae star Glen Washington was hospitalised for two days at the Piedmont Fayette Hospital in Fayetteville, Georgia, after experiencing exhaustion and dehydration.
The Kindness for Weakness singer had just completed back-to-back shows in Boston and New York, and then embarked on a gruelling cross country drive back to his home in Georgia. He woke up in the Piedmont Fayette Hospital hooked up to beeping medical machines and IV needles jammed into his arms.
“I was so surprised to wake up in the hospital and to see all these needles in me, “ Washington told The Gleaner. “The doctors said I was dehydrated, my magnesium and my iron were low, so that dropped my kidney functions and I passed out.”
The singer’s manager, Jackie Whyte Washington, explained that he fell ill on Sunday and had to be hospitalised for two days with symptoms of a ‘heat stroke’. She said that the staff at the hospital “treated “Glen like a king”. She said that Washington needed four bags of IV solutions and two bags of magnesium to address the low levels of magnesium in his body. In light of his health scare, Washington is urging his fellow entertainers to “stay hydrated” this summer.
NEGLIGENCE
“It is important to stay hydrated because of what happened to me the other day. As entertainers, we overlook heat and our body temperatures. We’re just not paying attention and this kind of negligence can get you into a bind. Nowadays, mi ah feel some heat, mi no know where it ah come from,” he said.
The summer of 2024 broke global heat records for the second straight year, making it one of the hottest times in recorded history. The period between June and August – summer in the Northern Hemisphere – was the world’s hottest such period since records began being kept in 1940, according to data published by Copernicus, Europe’s climate change service. And this year has seen sweltering conditions as well. June was exceptionally warm. That warmth has continued into July, with mean temperatures placing this summer, so far, in the top five per cent of all summers on record
“Prioritise drinking water throughout the day, even before you feel thirsty. Consider adding flavour with fruits or vegetables, and eat hydrating foods like watermelon, cucumbers, and berries. Dehydration is a serious thing with these hot summers. I was coming back from Boston, and with the intensity of the shows, the logistics of what it took to get there, there was no time to rest and hydrate,” Washington said.
The singer, who recently celebrated his 70th birthday with a bash at Prestige Palace in Freeport, Long Island, New York, said that he may refrain from doing consecutive shows in the near future.
“You have to get rest between the shows. If you don’t get rest, your voice won’t work. Sooner or later, you won’t even hear any thing. So I don’t plan to do back-to-back shows, I want to create space between shows so the body can rejuvenate. We’re not robots, we’re humans,” he said.
Washington, who is currently in the island, turned in an impressive performance at the Original Dancehall Thursdays at the Rebel T headquarters in St Andrew two days ago.
English (US) ·