[imagesource: Mike Marsland / WireImage]

On Monday, South African model and actress Charlbi Dean (full name Charlbi Dean Kriek) tragically passed away at the age of 32.

Reports at the time stated she died at a New York City hospital of a “sudden illness”.

Tributes poured in from around the world for the actress who recently starred in Ruben Östlund’s Triangle of Sadness, which was awarded the top prize at the Cannes Film Festival, the Palme d’Or.

It wasn’t long before those desperate to push a certain narrative started spreading unfounded medical claims regarding her death.

Dean’s brother, Alex Jacobs, spoke to Rolling Stone to clarify a few things:

So many questions still need answers, but one thing he feels sure about is that the flurry of online comments claiming Dean’s death was linked to Covid vaccines — messages he has seen and read himself — are not helpful.

“That is completely out of the question, from our point of view,” he tells Rolling Stone. “That’s not the first bandwagon you need to jump on. I think that’s completely ridiculous and extremely naïve.”

21-year-old Jacobs, who is based in Cape Town, told the publication that the moment she experienced her first symptoms through to her death all took place in the space of a day.

Dean was in New York with her fiancé, Luke Volker, when she fell ill and asked to be taken to an emergency room.

A matter of hours after being admitted she was declared dead. An autopsy took place on Wednesday to determine her cause of death:

“We still aren’t entirely sure (what happened). There’s an autopsy being done which we know might take quite a while. But what we have heard it that there was a viral infection in her lungs,” he says.

He adds that his sister was in a “very, very bad car accident” around 2009 that left her with a broken back, broken ribs and a missing spleen.

“They removed her spleen. It’s involved in fighting off infections, and that could have had something to do what happened. Her spleen not being there just added on to the reason whey she perhaps couldn’t fight it off,” he says.

Jacobs said Dean would speak to their mother every day and called her “extremely loving, more than anyone I could have ever known”.

Volker was at the hospital when Dean passed away.

He posted a message on Instagram thanking everybody for their messages of support:

 

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A post shared by Luke Volker (@lukechasevolker)

Dean’s acting career began way back in 2010 when she starred in Spud, returning for the 2013 sequel, Spud 2: The Madness Continues.

She also played Syonide, a character on the CW series Black Lightning, which has been running since 2018.

[source:rollingstone]