Mount Gambier city councillor, Kate Amoroso says her daughter is in ICU with meningococcal infection

A former model and race car driver who is now an SA councillor says her daughter is in hospital battling a serious brain infection.

A one-time model, race-car driver, ice addict and anti-drug campaigner - who is now a Mount Gambier councillor - has revealed her daughter has been hospitalised with a severe meningitis infection caused by meningococcal b.

Mount Gambier City councillor Kate Amoroso posted on Instagram on Wednesday that last week her daughter Tiana, 30, was rushed to the emergency department with a severe meningitis infection in her brain.

Ms Amoroso said Tiana was immediately put to sleep and given antibiotics to “fight the infection of her life”, remaining in the ICU for four days.

Kate Amoroso with her daughter Tiana on her 30th birthday. Picture: Supplied

As of Wednesday, Ms Amoroso said her daughter was “finally awake and talking”, getting better each day but is still “a way off from full recovery”.

After politely requesting for people to give Tiana her space by not visiting her while she’s recovering, Ms Amoroso reminded people that anyone experiencing extreme headaches and fevers should go to the emergency department as possible.

“Tiana was at work the morning she got sick and by that same night she was put to sleep in ICU – that is how rapidly the meningococcal took over her body,” Ms Amoroso said.

“If it weren’t for the quick response of South West Healthcare to act immediately she may not be with us.

“I know everyone loves her so much and is so worried about her but please try to refrain from contacting her and definitely give her space by not visiting her at this time whilst she recovers as she needs as little as stimulation as possible at the moment.

“There will be plenty of time to visit and check up on her once she is home and rested – at this stage we’re still not quite sure as to when that will be.”

Kate Amoroso at 21 years old before her drug addiction.

Mount Gambier Councillor Kate Amoroso in 2022. Picture: Emma Brasier

“I promise you all she is awake and talking and doing better every day.”

In 2015, Ms Amoroso – mother-of-three, former model, racing car driver and sportswoman – shared how an ice addiction starting two-and-a-half-years earlier completely derailed her life.

Starting to use drugs in her 20s, she then married a multmillionaire before moving to the Gold Coast where she got clean but fell back into drugs in the late 2000s after an injury.

At 41 years of age, she was detained after barricading herself insider her Mount Gambier home as police blocked off her street before trying to coax her out.

She told The Advertiser she had “wigged out” after an eight-day bender of injecting ice, taking other drugs and no sleep.

In the lead up to the incident she’d been using about $2000 worth of ice a week.

After surrendering to police, she was flown to Royal Adelaide Hospital, where she spent several weeks in a high-dependency ward unable to move and with no idea who she was.

Kate eventually returned to Mount Gambier in January after a stint in the rural and remote section of Glenside Hospital, where she encountered many other patients who had suffered ice psychosis.

Kate, who has two adult daughters aged in their early 20s, said her addiction had badly affected her relationship with her 12-year old son.

The former part-time model said she was prescribed painkillers and antidepressants after a 2008 work accident, which she believes led her on the path to ice addiction.

Kate vowed never to return to ice and to rebuild her life.

“I don’t feel tempted. Because I have the pictures, I have the scribbles I wrote in hospital and I have the images in my head of what it was like,” she said.

She is now an anti-drug campaigner and ran for SA-Best in the 2018 state election to representing anyone who has battled issues with addiction, mental health, domestic violence, and sexual assault.