Warning: Article contains graphic images
A fitness influencer said her body 'started to eat itself alive' after having 60 fat-burning injections.
Beatriz Amma says she already worked hard to keep fit and loved flaunting her bikini body when she moved to LA, California, US, in February 2021, with dreams of becoming an online fitness guru.
Advert
The 23-year-old decided to head to a spa, paying $800 for shots of vitamin B12 mixed with vitamin C and deoxycholic acid, a popular 'fat dissolver'.
Beatriz underwent around 60 painless injections, having ten in each arm, 20 in her back, and 20 in her stomach, but overnight she ended up with sickness, chills, and a fever.
Soon welts began to appear in the place of the injections and before long her 'rotting' skin began 'eating itself alive', before she was rushed to hospital believing she was 'going to die'.
Advert
Doctors discovered she had developed necrosis as it is believed the deoxycholic acid had not been injected properly, leading to 'subcutaneous mycobacterium abscessus' - flesh-eating skin disease.
Beatriz said: "My entire body started eating itself alive.
"My co-worker saw it and said 'this is freaking me out' so she let me come and stay at her house with her husband and two kids to look after me.
Advert
"She had only known me for two months but took me into her home and let me sleep in their bed while my skin was bursting open and eating itself.
"During that time I was just rotting in bed. I couldn't even put clothes on. I needed help going to the restroom. I needed help showering and changing.
"I needed help with every little thing that we take for granted in our day to day."
Advert
After two weeks of staying at her colleague, Beatriz was rushed to the hospital's emergency room one night while in so much pain she believed she was going to die.
Beatriz said: "I woke up in tears at 3am one night and thought 'I have to go to the ER'.
"The pain was excruciating. The infection was just everywhere."
The doctors then discovered she had flesh-eating skin disease and began an aggressive treatment plan, which landed her in hospital from May 2021 to September 2021.
Advert
By March 2022, all Beatriz's wounds had closed up but she continued to be on IV antibiotics for six hours a day.
Despite moving to oral antibiotics in September 2022 and fully coming off them in February this year, she had to restart treatment in July as the disease began to resurface.
"I'm on year three and it still isn't over," she said of her illness.
Advert
"I would never have thought that something so simple could almost take my life and leave me still fighting for my life."
Niamh Shackleton