Emmerdale’s Billy and Dawn have worlds turned upside-down as baby diagnosed with leukaemia in harrowing scenes

EMMERDALE has announced a 'devastating' new storyline as Billy and Dawn's baby son is diagnosed with leukaemia.

The ITV soap covers real life issues in the fictional Yorkshire village, particularly when it comes to health-related storylines.

Emmerdale is already exploring Parkinson's Disease following Eric Pollard's diagnosis, and in recent scenes, Chas Dingle was diagnosed with breast cancer and had a double mastectomy.

Now, the soap will deal with another heartbreaking storyline involving Billy and Dawn Fletcher.

The couple welcomed son Evan just before Christmas, but in upcoming scenes they will be left devastated when their baby boy is diagnosed with Acute Lymphoblastic Leukaemia. 

Speaking at an Emmerdale press day, show producer Laura Shaw explained: "We've got a big story coming up for Billy and Dawn.

"We've seen these two go through a whole heap of challenges in their relationship.

"They've finally got married, they survived Meena, Dawn got pregnant, they had baby Evan and it's been fairly rosy for these two over the past few months.

"We're going to see their world totally rocked when, almost out of nowhere, Evan is diagnosed with acute lymphoblastic leukaemia (ALL).

"ALL is one of the most common childhood leukaemias. I think there's 650 children and young adults diagnosed with that every year in the UK."

She continued: "What we really wanted to show with this story is what a stress and strain a long-term illness like this can put on a family.

"What we'll see is how the roles of Dawn and Billy are changed almost overnight and out of nowhere. We'll see how Lucas and Clemmie are affected and the stress that it puts on those sibling dynamics.