Comedy legend Eric Idle, 82, has been rushed to hospital twice within just three days, sparking concern among fans after he admitted, “I shouldn’t be alive” – a chilling reflection on his past cancer battle.
The Monty Python icon, best known for his work on the groundbreaking Flying Circus series in the 1970s, revealed he had been suffering from gastroenteritis and required urgent treatment at Cedars-Sinai Hospital in Los Angeles.
Sharing the news on social media, Idle thanked the “kind and helpful” staff of the hospital’s GI ward after his second visit in 72 hours, saying: “The second time in three days. I think I’m suffering from Gastroenteritis. I love you people.”
Fans were quick to flood his posts with messages of support, urging the comedy hero to take care and recover soon. “The world would be a less amusing place without you,” one comment read.
The health scare comes just a year after Idle stunned fans by saying he “shouldn’t be alive” following his survival from pancreatic cancer. Diagnosed in 2019, he credited early detection and surgery for saving his life.
He also recalled the dark irony of being diagnosed while working on Death: The Musical. At the time, he jokingly asked his doctor for a ‘dramatic’ form of cancer for a character’s storyline and was told: “Pancreatic cancer – it can finish people off in three weeks.”
Years later, when that same doctor told him he had it, Idle said he laughed at first, thinking it was a joke. He’s since become an advocate for living each day to the fullest, saying he now cherishes every moment.
