British influencer Ebony McIntosh was taken to hospital in the capital Colombo on Saturday (1 February) as police say she was reportedly suffering with vomiting, nausea and breathing difficulties. The 24-year-old, from Derby, had a sudden death.

And German national Nadine Raguse has been named as the second person to day after staying at the Miracle Colombo City hostel. The 26-year-old also reportedly fell critically ill.

McIntosh’s cause of death has not yet been identified as a post-mortem examination will take place after her family arrive in the South Asian country on Monday (10 February).

Police said a room in the hostel had been fumigated beforehand (Google Maps)

The British Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office said: “We are supporting the family of a British woman who died in Sri Lanka, and are in contact with the local authorities.”

The digital marketing and social media manager was just days into the first week of her ‘dream holiday’ as tributes describe her as the ‘kindest, funniest, and most determined person’.

Sri Lanka Police spokesperson Buddhika Manatunga said that a room in the hostel had been fumigated to treat bed bugs before McIntosh and Raguse fell ill.

And officers are now investigating the possibility that the women’s deaths were a result of poisoning by noxious pesticides.

The Miracle Colombo City hostel has now been temporarily closed until the post-mortem takes place.

McIntosh’s younger sister, India, wrote in a tribute: “To my Ebony, my beautiful sister, thank you, thank you for being my older sister, one better than I could’ve ever asked for.

Ebony McIntosh died suddenly aged 24 (GoFundMe)

“I am truly heartbroken, I can’t believe I am writing this, it feels like some nightmare I haven’t woken up from yet. We will get justice for you, you had so much life left to live.”

Her family have since started a GoFundMe to help raise funds to be able to get over to Sri Lanka in order to ‘bring her back home’.

India wrote they are ‘absolutely heartbroken’ as they described it as ‘like a nightmare’.

Before her trip was ‘cruelly cut short’, she explained: “She was full of excitement for her adventures ahead, in typical Ebony style she had spent months researching and planning and drawing up schedules for the coming months.”

It’s added that she ‘sadly and tragically’ passed away ‘within a few hours’ of arriving at the hospital.

You and your mates would be having competitions at the pool to see who could last the longest before a teacher or lifeguard, or just any sense-talking adult would have a go and tell you to put a stop to it. But despite how long you would show off about swimming underwater for, it has nothing on this lot.

As the remote tribe of the Bajau people can swim underwater for five hours a day with incredible footage showing their amazing ability:

Living across Indonesia, Malaysia and the Philippines they are actually better endowed in the spleen department.

A study found they have a ‘mutated gene’ in the form of PDE10A, which correlates with a larger spleen size, helping them stay underwater for longer.

The Bajau can spend hours each day swimming underwater, able to hold their breath for several minutes at a time while also being able to dive down to incredible depths.

The University of Copenhagen’s Melissa Ilardo, one of the authors of the study of the Bajau, told the BBC’s Inside Science programme: “For possibly thousands of years, [they] have been living on house boats, travelling from place to place in the waters of South-East Asia and visiting land only occasionally. So everything they need, they get from the sea.

“When they’re diving in the traditional way, they dive repeatedly for about eight hours a day, spending about 60 percent of their time underwater. So this could be anything from 30 seconds to several minutes, but they’re diving to depths of over 70m.”

In case you’re confused, let’s clear up why having a larger spleen helps in this department.

When you hold your breath and submerge yourself in water it triggers a dive response which slows down your heart rate and makes the blood vessels in your extremities smaller in order to preserve supply for your vital organs.

The spleen then contracts due to the dive response, with Ilardo describing it like ‘a reservoir for oxygenated red blood cells’ that functions ‘like a biological scuba tank’.

In fact, her study of the Bajau found that they had spleens that were about 50 percent larger than their neighbours.

Diving down with wooden goggles and weights around their wastes, the Bajau have lived for countless generations off the produce of the sea. (BBC Global/YouTube)

However, a life so closely connected to the sea also means they’ve been among the most affected by climate change and ecological devastation of the oceans, as they’re often the first to suffer from things going wrong in the sea.

Damaged coral reefs have affected their way of life and they’ve seen significantly fewer fish in the sea, which is a major danger to people who for centuries have cultivated the ocean’s bounty.

There are also concerns that their culture is suffering in other ways due to the pollution of plastic.

Santarawi Lalisan, an elder statesman of the tribe, told Giuseppe from Project Happiness that their culture is now dying due to Western ways.

ITV News has reported that ‘at least one production company was aware of multiple concerns’ made by crew members, ‘but continued to work with him’.

D’Acampo firmly denies the allegations.

A woman named Hannah told the outlet that D’Acampo allegedly made highly inappropriate, sexual comments to her during a magazine shoot in 2011, in front of the whole crew.

“He did not think that was an inappropriate thing to say to me,” Hannah added as the people besides her at the time allegedly ‘looked nervously into their cups of tea’.

Gino D’Acampo’s legal team said of this accusation: “This allegation from almost 15 years ago has never, until now via a media request for comment, been raised or put to Mr D’Acampo.

“He does not recall it, nor accept that this happened. Mr D’Acampo is horrified to be accused of ‘power play’ and an ‘aggressive act’. He emphatically and unequivocally denies these allegations.”

Another woman, in which the outlet is calling ‘Natalie’, has opened up about an alleged incident during a location TV shoot.

“He opened the door in his boxer shorts, nothing else. And jumped on the bed and was sort of – leg up,” she said. “I think he feels he’s in a position of power and he can say and do what he wants. I see it all as quite aggressive, really. I didn’t want to do it anymore. Didn’t want to do the production, didn’t want to be anywhere near him.”

D’Acampo’s legal team has denied the claims (Danny Martindale/WireImage)

D’Acampo’s legal team has also denied these accusations.

“Mr D’Acampo categorically denies these allegations of inappropriate sexual behaviour,” they said.

“To his knowledge no such allegations have been made against him in relation to his time on Gino’s Italian Express and this is the first time, six years later, he has been informed of these alleged incidents, and he does not accept them, not least because some of this is considered by Mr D’Acampo to be a fabricated work of fiction.”

LADbible Group has contacted Gino D’Acampo’s representatives for additional comment.

ITV provided a statement to LADbible, which reads: “ITV is completely committed to creating an environment where everyone is treated with respect and feels able to give of their best. Our promise to those we work with is that where a complaint is made, or serious concern raised, we will always investigate and if we find that something inappropriate has happened, we will take action.

“The same standards are expected of all production companies who make programmes on ITV’s behalf. It is production companies who have the primary responsibility for the duty of care of everyone they work with, both on and off screen, when making shows. We make clear our expectations of producers and have robust and comprehensive policies which we implement contractually.

One of the victims spoke with ITV News Correspondent Sejal Karia (ITV News)

“We have strengthened these policies in the last 5 years and have set up a dedicated Complaints Handling Unit in 2024 to manage any complaints we receive about on screen presenters and ensure ITV has a centralised view across different productions.

“The standards of behaviour that ITV expects are very clear. Everyone working with ITV is subject to ITV’s Code of Ethics and Conduct. At ITV we treat everyone with courtesy, fairness, dignity and respect and do not tolerate abusive behaviour of any form in the workplace. We have also reiterated our expectations of our on screen presenters’ behaviour through our Conduct and Standards Guidelines for On Screen Personalities issued in 2024. All of the concerns and complaints raised by those who have spoken to ITN describe behaviour which is inappropriate and unacceptable.

“Most of them were not reported to ITV at the time. Where issues have been raised with ITV action has been taken. We can only act where we know that concerns have been raised, and will now be following up on those that had not previously been reported to us.

“If anyone has experienced or witnessed inappropriate behaviour while working on an ITV show, we encourage them to raise their concerns with us either directly or through our confidential speaking up hotline Safecall (www.safecall.co.uk/report).”

Steven Lawayne Nelson was executed by lethal injection in Huntsville, Texas, after spending 13 years locked up for the murder of a pastor.

He was put on death row after being convicted of beating, strangling and suffocating Reverend Clint Dobson, 28, during a robbery at the NorthPointe Baptist Church in 2011, while his secretary, Judy Elliot, was badly beaten but ended up surviving.

Nelson denied killing Dobson, however, saying he was at the church to be a lookout for the robbery, claiming that Dobson and Elliot were already on the floor when he arrived and were still breathing.

Marking the second execution to take place in the US since the start of the year, Nelson was pronounced dead at 6.50pm local time on Wednesday evening.

The 37-year-old made a series of chilling remarks as the process got underway, most of which were in reference to his wife Helene Noa Dubois, who got married two weeks before his execution date, according to AP.

In his final moments, Nelson repeatedly told his spouse that he loved and appreciated her while she watched on through a window a short distance away.

Dubois had brought their white dog into the witness area, which she scooped up in her arms to watch the execution as Nelson said: “Give Monkey a hug for me.”

Addressing his wife, Nelson said: “It is what it is,” before encouraging her to ‘enjoy life’.

“I’m not scared, it’s cold s**t in here,” the killer added. “But I’m at peace, I’m ready to be at home. Let’s ride, Warden.”

As the lethal dose of pentobarbital was administered, Nelson reportedly told Dubois to ‘let him go to sleep’ before he was seen mouthing the word ‘love’.

AP reported that he then briefly began trembling as the drug took effect, before he was pronounced dead 24 minutes later.

Nelson’s ‘spiritual advisor’ Jeff Hood was also present at the execution and told USA Today: “It took them forever to declare that he had passed. He fought to the very end.”

The 37-year-old denied being responsible for the pastor’s death (CECILE CLOCHERET/AFP via Getty Images)

Nelson was the first of four death row inmates who are set to be put to death in the States over the next three months.

He previously revealed that he had left it up to Dubois – who he connected with while in prison – to decide whether she wanted to witness his final moments.

Nelson explained his relationship with the French native began on a friendly basis, but as ‘the years progressed, the love and the feelings progressed more’, telling AFP: “I’ve never had human contact with her, it’s always been behind glass.

“When someone can love you behind glass and not touch you, or see what your scent smells like, none of that, and still love you deeply, unconditionally, that is something wonderful.”

Discussing her watching his execution, Nelson said: “I really don’t want her to see that, me getting pumped full of drugs and being overdosed with drugs to kill me, to make my heart stop.

“I think that would leave a bad impression. That would override the good memories we’ve had over the years, to always close her eyes and see that. But if she makes that choice to be there then that’s her choice.”

Nelson was also indicted over the death of another inmate who was murdered in 2012, however, he was never tried for this charge.