The story of Australian tourist Amy Lecons, who was bitten by a venomous snake while hiking in the Albanian Alps, was presented at the end of June as a success story for the Albanian health service. The Ministry of Health announced at the time that medical teams had reacted immediately, that the tourist had received the necessary treatment and that she was in good health.
But, nearly two months later, Lecons himself gives a much more complex version of what happened.
In an exclusive interview with Truth Times, the Australian, a trail runner based in New Zealand, recounts not only her fear that she might die alone on the mountain, but also the difficulties she says she encountered in contacting emergency services, the conditions at the hospital, and how, according to her, the story was later used to create a much more positive image of the Albanian healthcare system than the one she had experienced.
Lecons says that after the bite, she tried to contact 112. According to her account for Truth Times, communication failed and she was unable to obtain help through the first emergency calls.
At that point, she called her father, Robert Lecons, a doctor in Australia. He instructed her from thousands of miles away on how to immobilize her leg and try to keep her heart rate down while efforts were made to locate her and organize a rescue.
A decisive role, according to her, was also played by the owner of the hostel where she had stayed in Shkodra, who began contacting local structures and managed to establish a connection with the Valbona summer clinic.
Lecons does not spare thanks for the people who reached out to her. On the contrary, in the interview she makes a clear distinction between the problems of the system and the people who saved her. She expresses gratitude to the staff of the Valbona clinic, the nurse and the residents who helped to get her out of the difficult terrain. One of them, according to her, even carried her on his back.
The problems, according to the Australian, continued after she arrived at Bajram Curri's hospital and received the antivenom.
In an interview with Truth Times, Lecons claims it took her about a day to get toilet paper. When she asked for ice for her injured leg, she said, she was told the hospital didn't have any and that she had to ask someone to buy it outside.
She also describes a room with only one electrical outlet, which meant that appliances had to be used in turn. Even more problematic is her account of the basic living conditions: Because she could not walk and the entrance did not allow for a wheelchair, she says she was forced to relieve herself in bed.
These are claims made by Lecon in the Truth Times interview and have not been independently verified. But they create a stark contrast to how the event was officially communicated in Albania.
At the end of June, the Ministry of Health declared that Albanian health structures were prepared to guarantee the safety of tourists even in the most remote mountainous areas. According to the Ministry, teams from the Valbona Summer Health Center had reacted immediately, provided first aid on the ground and transported them to health structures.
The videos Lecons released at the time, however, showed a more dramatic situation. In one of them, she said that the ambulance was unable to find her, while she was heard screaming for help.
Precisely how her story was subsequently used in Albania is one of the strongest parts of the Truth Times interview.
Lecons claims that Albanian media mainly picked up on the positive parts of her videos, focusing on the rescue and dedication of the people who helped her, but leaving out the problems she says she encountered in the emergency room and later in the hospital.
According to her, the journalists who published the story had not contacted her prior to publication.
She also disputes the way her health condition was presented. While the Ministry stated that the tourist had received the necessary treatment and was “in perfect health,” Lecons tells Truth Times that at that point she was still unable to walk. The Ministry’s official statement about her good condition was widely reported by Albanian media.
In the end, the Australian says that conversations with Albanians made her see her story differently. For her, talking only about the hospitality and the people who saved her was not enough. She decided to also share what she claims to have seen firsthand in the healthcare system.
The message with which she summarizes her experience is perhaps the strongest indictment of the entire interview:
"A country cannot take care of tourists if it cannot first take care of its own people."
Amy Lecons' story remains, in fact, a story of two realities: Of the people who entered the mountain and did everything to save a stranger, and of a system that, according to her testimony, had difficulty providing even the most basic things afterwards.
And it is precisely this distinction that was lost when the case turned into a success story of Albanian medicine.
