It was blindingly obvious. The palace never releases anything about the The Queen’s health unless it’s absolutely unavoidable, and then it’s as little and as vague as possible. She was also a patient, as well as head of state and thus entitled to confidentiality, and was a very private person about private matters, as well as a stickler for protocol for matters of state. ‘Under medical supervision’ is a very odd term, and could mean anything. Not ‘being treated for…’ or ‘resting comfortably’ or even ‘being cared for’ and no mention of transfer to hospital (I assume she preferred to stay at Balmoral) I took it to mean something had happened from which she was very definitely not expected to recover, and that she would die within hours. I assume if something had happened overnight the family would have been up there earlier, so I surmised a sudden event late morning. It was also obvious the media knew, given all the black and even worse filler than usual. I’m just curious about the process.
It’s pretty common for someone to take a few hours to die, even in the final stages. It’s not a switching off. They can stop breathing for minutes at a time, then start again for a few breaths. I’m mostly just wondering if at 12.30 she had already died. ‘Under medical supervision’ is such an odd thing to say, and then to haul all the family up (but none of the children. Children get taken to peaceful deathbeds, but not often afterwards) and get NW, HE and the black jackets out of storage suggests a….certainty. They may not have told the PM etc until a bit later. There’s still a family involved here, and they are live on tv in the HOC, aren’t they? Possibly they weren’t sure of Liz’s poker face.
At the time I thought she was dying and they were unsure how long. I had expected an announcement overnight to be tidily reported in the morning, but now I’m wondering.