A Shropshire cancer sufferer who spent her life savings on a dream holiday for her husband faces losing the trip because she has been refused travel insurance.

Kathleen Lewis, from Pant, near Oswestry, has just 24 hours to find a company who will insure her so that she can take her husband Rhys on a trip of a lifetime to Canada and Alaska.

If she fails to get insurance, the couple will lose their holiday and their money.

Today she warned other people with serious illnesses not to book holidays without first securing their insurance.

She said the dream had become a nightmare and she did not want other people to be in the same position.

Mrs Lewis, 52, was diagnosed with breast cancer in May last year then in September she was told it had spread to her bones.

She has endured endless chemotherapy and other treatment and says the “outlook is not good”.

“I wanted to do something positive and decided to book my husband’s dream holiday. I wanted to share his dream before anything happened to me,” she said.

She took advice over insurance and was told it could cost several hundreds of pounds but decided to go ahead although it would mean using all her savings.

But now she has been told she cannot get cover for the holiday.

“If we do not find insurance by tomorrow night or change the names on the holiday, the travel firm has said we lose the holiday altogether,” Mrs Lewis said.

“Everyone has been so helpful to us since I was diagnosed with cancer, I can’t thank them enough, but this holiday has been a nightmare.

“Apparently the insurance problem is worse in America, which includes Canada and Alaska. If we were travelling to the Far East for example, I could apparently get insurance.

“I really don’t want other people to find themselves in the same position, it has been so stressful.”

North Shropshire MP Owen Paterson is also trying to help Mrs Lewis and her husband go on their dream holiday.

He said: “We are asking publicly for help from anybody who knows an insurance business or any way round this problem.”

By Sue Austin