'Below Deck's' Izzy Wouters Got Sick on Her Charter Season — Was It COVID-19?

We knew back when it started that the current season of Below Deck would have to contend with COVID-19 as the global pandemic ravaged the world. The current charter season had to wrap up early as a result of the worldwide lockdowns.

But what we weren't prepared for was for a crew member to fall ill with the coronavirus, if that's indeed what ends up happening. With deckhand Izzy Wouters currently quarantining in her bunk after a few days of feeling lousy, we can't help but wonder whether Izzy had COVID during her time on Below Deck or whether it was just her Guillain-Barré syndrome flaring up. 

So, did Izzy catch the coronavirus during her time working on My Seanna? Keep reading while we investigate!

"Izzy feeling ill — does she have #Coronavirus?" one person tweeted while watching Jan. 4's episode. Izzy replied to the fan's tweet, teasing the upcoming episode: "You'll have to keep watching."

On the series, we watched as Izzy wakes up on the morning of March 1 feeling "like s--t," she tells her team. She has a sore throat, body aches, and everything she eats is "tast[ing] like sick."

The stew-turned-deckhand opens up a bit more about her symptoms in a phone call with her sister, with whom she reveals her fear that she is having another flare-up of Guillain-Barré syndrome, the autoimmune disorder that she's mentioned has left her temporarily paralyzed in the past. 

And though her sister asks Izzy if she thinks she might have COVID, the deckhand responds that she highly doubts it, as she was last at an airport three weeks before.

For what it's worth, while the body aches and sore throat could be COVID symptoms, food tasting "like sick" isn't exactly a known sign of the coronavirus, so we're hopeful that whatever she's sick with is something other than the virus.

While Izzy tries to put on a brave face and work in light of her symptoms, Eddie thankfully sends her down to her bunk early. If it comes down to her being sick with the coronavirus, it's a smart move on Eddie's part not to have her co-mingling with the guests or the rest of the crew.

Izzy recently made waves when she came out on Instagram, writing, "HELLO MY NAME IS IZZY AND I AM OUT AND PROUD #LankyLezzy #P--syPlease #OutAndProud."

But her sexual orientation, which it turns out she shared as a result of thirsty male viewers sliding into her Instagram DMs, isn't the only thing we've learned in the past few weeks of making Izzy's acquaintance. 

In earlier episodes this season, the deckhand has revealed that she struggles with health issues, specifically with a rare autoimmune disorder called Guillain-Barré. Izzy has explained that she got so sick with Guillain-Barré during a prior charter season that she was left pretty much paralyzed.

She revealed that she couldn't walk for a period of time and had to rebuild her strength and stamina the last time she fell ill. Guillain-Barré, it turns out, is a rare condition where the immune system attacks the nerves. 

Symptoms start as weakness and tingling in the feet and legs that spreads to the upper body and can cause paralysis. While these also don't sound like the symptoms Izzy is suffering from this season, we hope she's able to finish the charter season along with her team!

On the bright side, judging from her Instagram page, whatever went down last year aboard My Seanna seems to be a thing of the past, as she seems happy and healthy today.