A man with a severe lactose allergy was rushed to hospital and nearly died when a McDonald's employee gave him the wrong drink by mistake.
Manchester man George Brown ordered a black coffee because of his milk allergy but soon found himself in hospital after sipping on a hot chocolate meant for another customer.
The 22-year-old had ordered his black coffee through the self-service kiosk in a bid to minimise the risk of human error.
Moments later, he took a sip of the drink handed to him and his tongue immediately swelled up.
"I took one sip of the drink and spat it out," Brown said.
"My tongue started swelling immediately. I was wheezing, dizzy and short of breath."
"The risk with an allergic reaction is that they are unpredictable. You can't tell if they're going to get worse.
"A reaction like this can narrow your airways to the point where you can't breathe — respiratory arrest — and then the heart stops — cardiac arrest — which means death.
"That's the severe level it could have gone to. I could have died."
Brown, a paramedic, was luckily on shift with his colleague at the time of the incident so was seen to immediately.
Colleague Richard McManus gave him nebulised medication and an antihistamine to reduce the swelling before he was transferred to hospital.
Despite receiving immediate medication, Brown lost consciousness on arrival at the hospital where medics had to stabilise him.
McDonald's has since apologised saying their service was "simply not good enough".
Following Brown's dice with death, the McDonald's store manager emailed the paramedic inviting him back for a free black coffee and breakfast.
The fast-food outlet sent him meal vouchers and apologised for the error.
McDonald's said: "We absolutely recognise that this mistake was unacceptable and sincerely apologise to the customer in question.
"This was simply not good enough. We have a number of procedures in place to avoid inaccurate orders, but in this case these were clearly not followed.
"The incident was fully investigated and the restaurant team have undergone specific additional training to ensure a mistake like this is not made again."