Abi Burton Lives To Play Another Day

The 25-year-old Briton is a living miracle and a testimony of hope to many sports lovers around the world. Less than three years ago, Abi Burton’s health took a dark turn, and no one could have imagined seeing her on the rugby pitch ever again.

This weekend as Rugby lovers shifts their focus to the Principality Stadium for the Wales v England Women’s six nations 2025, there is reason to celebrate. A very emotional story will be playing in front of the 18,000 fans at the stadium, as Abi Burton who had to relearn to walk and talk following her near-death experience, joins the English Red roses to defend against Wales this weekend.

It was shortly after representing her country in the Tokyo Olympics 2021, that Abi started experiencing depression like symptoms. Her low moods and outbursts didn’t look so serious at first given that she was recovering from an MCL injury at that time. Soon after thing took a toll for the worst. She became wild, started punching people and started having seizures. At this point she was admitted to a psychiatric ward, as specialists suspected the condition to be either schizophrenic or bipolar. These were ruled out by tests.

Through a blood test, she was found to be suffering from autoimmune encephalitis, a condition where the immune system mistakenly attacks the brain. According to the Brain Institute at the Oregon health and Science university, Autoimmune encephalitis is a collection of related conditions in which the body’s immune system attacks the brain, causing inflammation. The immune system produces substances called antibodies that mistakenly attack brain cells.

At this point the family was advised accordingly and Abi had to be put into a medically induced coma. “My Dad holds a lot of guilt around that day because he basically thought that he was killing me by sending me off to be put in a coma,” said Abi on the England Rugby podcast “the O2 inside line.” On 25 March 2025. She was in a coma for 25 days and in hospital for a total of 76 days. Recovery was slow but she progressed well following the correct diagnosis and treatment.