South London woman rushed to hospital after spicy Wingstop chicken wing binge

Nea-Jude was rushed to King’s College Hospital

A south London woman ended up in hospital after consuming an excessive number of Wingstop chicken wings. Nea-Jude Ioannou says she was admitted to King’s College Hospital in London after being left bedridden with severe abdominal pain.

The 22 year old claims that paramedics initially suspected her appendix had burst. However, after six hours in A&E she was finally examined and given a CT scan, which revealed the culprit was actually severe constipation — brought on by eating too many Wingstop takeaways.

Nea-Jude says she had been placing two orders a week, opting for the hottest flavour, Atomic, on her wings — which doctors attributed as the root cause of her condition. She said: “It started with pains in my lower abdomen that were building and building, then for three days I was basically bed-ridden unable to move.

“It was the worst pain that I have ever felt in my life. I wasn’t able to eat or sleep because of the pain. Even the paramedics thought I might have appendicitis, so they immediately rushed me to A&E. It was just severe tummy issues from Wingstop.

“I think I felt a bit silly. I felt like I brought it on myself. The NHS is so overrun already, and I felt like a nuisance.” Nea-Jude says the stomach trouble, which occurred in February 2024, was accompanied by night sweats, pins and needles, and pain when breathing. The former student, who was studying Film and Television at University of the Arts London at the time, had hoped the symptoms would subside, but after five days she finally rang 111 and operators dispatched an ambulance to her Peckham accommodation.

She arrived at hospital at around 6pm and didn’t leave until 7am the following morning – with her father even catching a flight back from New York to be by her side. When the results revealed the issue was in fact constipation, Nea-Jude says the doctor told her it is becoming increasingly common amongst Gen Z.

The marketing worker believes this is partly attributable to food influencers posting videos known as mukbangs featuring extreme foods. The flavour she ordered, Atomic, is made with Habanero peppers and registers between 200,000 to 350,000 Scoville Heat Units.

She said: “There is such a culture around spicy food and mukbang culture now with trying the craziest foods. Now it is seafood boils and hotpots. I was getting the most crazy flavours ever. It is all about challenging yourself with food.

“I think mukbangs are contributing to the issue. I see a reel come up on my feed for a new place with a quirk to it and you think ‘I need to try this.'”

Nea-Jude also holds money apps partly responsible for making takeaways more accessible, alongside fast food chains that deliberately target students through their marketing campaigns. She continued: “They were really marketing to students that you could buy now and pay later and I thought it was so easy so I was getting Wingstop all the time.

“Especially as a student it was really appealing because it was fast and the meal deals you could get were cheap for Deliveroo. I think it was across my whole diet. It became easy fixes.

“The rise in how easy it is to get takeaways with these high salt low fibre meals just causes more issues with people’s digestive systems.” Medics provided her with pain relief and a two-week course of laxatives, which eventually took effect three days later, bringing considerable relief.

Since then, Nea-Jude, who now resides in Crouch End, North London, says she takes her wellbeing far more seriously and visits her GP regularly for check-ups. She also makes a conscious effort to eat more whole foods, though she still occasionally treats herself to takeaways — Wingstop included — even if she steers well clear of the Atomic flavour.

After sharing her ordeal on TikTok this week, she says numerous others have got in touch to say they’ve experienced exactly the same thing. Nea-Jude said: “It really made me evaluate what I am putting in my body and since then I have been on a health grind. I have seen so much change in my life and in my energy. I still love a Wingstop as a treat. The food in moderation is fine, it is just the habit that I had with it.”