THE wife of a Kidderminster doctor who died two days before Christmas from meningitis is warning young adults to get vaccinated against the disease.

Dr John Spalding, 55, woke up with a cold at 3am on December 23, 2014, after wrapping with presents with his wife, Di, 56, the evening before - ten hours later, he had died.

John, a practising GP for 27 years, had no idea his flu was in fact an aggressive strain of meningococcal meningitis (menW) and septicaemia.

Mother-of-three Di, a physiotherapist, is now supporting the charity Meningitis Research Foundation (MRF) to raise awareness of the vaccine that can help prevent the disease.

Di said the only protection is vaccination as if it happened to her again she "would never recognise it" because symptoms of meningitis can be similar to flu, but become rapidly worse.

The couple went to bed at 11pm before John woke Di at 3am to say he had a temperature and he was shivering and he said he was getting flu.

She gave her husband paracetamol and some ibuprofen before he went back to sleep. He woke up at 6.45am with a temperature, rigors and saying he felt sick.

She said: "At about midday I heard some movement upstairs so I went to check on him with my youngest, Tim. John was sat up on the bed and he just said to me 'call an ambulance'.

"I said 'are you sure?' Then he started talking rubbish to me and fell back. The septicaemia had spread to his brain.

"We called an ambulance but by this point his colour had deteriorated. The operator said get him on the floor and start resuscitation.

"Tim and I carried on giving resuscitation, but we knew after three minutes that he had died.

"The ambulance arrived within ten minutes and they carried on trying to revive him, but he was dead."

Di and Tim, 22, travelled with John to Worcestershire Royal Hospital. John was finally pronounced dead at 4pm that day.

She added: "The major struggle I had was the suddenness and the rapidity of his death.

"Alive one minute, dead the next.

"There was no time to say goodbye, no time for adjustment.

"But the other thing for me is if this happened again I would never recognise it.

"He was a doctor - if it can happen to him it can happen to anyone."

A particularly deadly strain of menW, ST-11, is on the rise in the UK. Although babies, young children and teenagers are at the highest risk, around half of all cases occur in adults over the age of 45.

Di said: "Obviously the risks are quite low, and I accept that life is a risk, but people need to know to make the decision about whether to get vaccinated themselves.

"John was not a high risk for this, but he died from it. I am not advocating that the NHS pays for everyone to be vaccinated, we can't afford that.

"But I would say teenagers and first year uni students should get their free vaccine and adults should be aware of the risks and consider it. It's a small cost to pay.

"Because the only way to stop it is by preventing it through vaccination, it's so rapid, so aggressive that you can't stop it once you've got it."

Early signs of the disease are usually fever, vomiting, headache and feeling unwell. Limb pain, pale skin, and cold hands and feet often appear earlier than the rash, neck stiffness, dislike of bright lights and confusion.

For more information, visit meningitis.org/symptoms.