Merel Ek contracted a very malignant form of diarrhea during her stay at the resort of Today Inside sponsor Corendon, but seems to be joking about the cause. “It’s quite possible.”
It was so serious that Merel Ek was forced to mention it in the Today Inside group app last week: she urgently needed anti-diarrheal medication, because things were really getting out of hand in her room. The political reporter of course knew that that call would be used against her on television, so the need must have been really great.
Megadiarrhea
TV critic Victor Vlam has a strong feeling that Merel contracted diarrhea at the resort of Today Inside sponsor Corendon on Curaçao, where the program is currently broadcasting from. He has the feeling that she is not completely honest about that, he says in the podcast Victor Indicates TV.
“There are a lot of sponsor expressions to be seen in the program. It can hardly be missed that it is sponsored by Corendon. There are many explicit sponsorship expressions, but also other ways in which that program is influenced by sponsors. It struck me that last week Merel Ek told a story that she had diarrhea.”
No note
Merel clearly does not want to discredit sponsor Corendon, according to Victor. “She immediately emphasized that it had nothing to do with the food. Then I thought: yes, but how do you know? If I have diarrhea, there is normally not a note with an explanation of where it comes from.”
He continues: “So it is something where you don’t know exactly where it comes from. But of course she doesn’t know that either, but she just wanted to make it clear that it was not the food, because that is something that the sponsor would of course not be very happy with.”
Jokes
Under the yoke of Corendon, the VI team is not entirely free to do whatever they want, according to Victor. “When you get money, and I suspect it is a lot of money, you should of course not say something that the sponsor has a problem with.”
He concludes: “You see a little more caution with those kinds of jokes than you would see if the program were simply broadcast from the Netherlands.”