Boy who went into surgery with Yorkshire accent comes out speaking like a toff

 

Last updated at 13:33pm on 17th September 2007 Comments (4)

A ten-year-old boy who recovered from a life-threatening bout of meningitis has astounded doctors after emerging from brain surgery with a completely different accent.

 

Brave William McCartney-Moore was struck down with the virus in March last year. After recovering from brain surgery, he amazed his family and experts by losing his distinctive Yorkshire twang as he began speaking in a posh accent.

His baffled mum Ruth said: "He just kept on surprising doctors. He survived the operation and the most amazing thing is that he came out of surgery with a completely different accent."

 

Scroll down for more...

Posh speak: William McCartney-Moore began speaking with a posh accent after surgery

 

"He went in with a York accent and came out all posh. He no longer had short 'a' and 'u' vowel sounds, they were all long." Worried Ruth, a music teacher from York, took 18 months off work to nurse her son through his long recovery.

She added: "It all began with a headache. He said his head really hurt above one eye and he had a high temperature. There was a bug going around school, so my husband and I didn't think it was any more than that."

"But a few days later he had a massive seizure." William was rushed into hospital and doctors found he had a rare strain of meningitis called empyaema, or pus on the brain, and he was operated on immediately.

"All the doctors and surgeons thought he was going to die - nobody thought he was going to come out of surgery. Before he went in I cut off a lock of his hair to keep."

 

Recovering in hospital: William had a rare strain of meningitis

 

"He lost everything. He couldn't read or write, he couldn't recognise things, he had no recollection of places he'd been to and things he'd done and he'd lost all his social skills.

"He went from being such a bright, lovely, wonderful eight-year-old who was totally confident and socially aware, to being a two-year-old who followed me everywhere like a toddler.

"At one stage he became completely allergic to all antibiotics and turned red - you couldn't touch him because his skin hurt so much."

William is now almost fully recovered, albeit with a different accent to his classmates at Hempland Primary School in York.

:toff:

 

Jolly good.