Former British prime minister Margaret Thatcher was to stay in the hospital over the weekend after breaking her arm in a fall, the 83-year-old’s spokesman said on Saturday.
The frail former “Iron Lady,” who has suffered from dementia for a number of years, tripped at her London home on Friday, breaking a bone in her upper arm. She was rushed to a nearby hospital.
Her son Mark visited her early on Saturday and said she was in “good spirits” and “recovering well.”
Thatcher’s spokesman later said she was “comfortable,” adding: “She will be in hospital at least until Monday when doctors will reassess her condition.”
Baroness Thatcher was Britain’s first and so far only female prime minister She headed a Conservative government between 1979 and 1990.
“She had a very good night. Nice and relaxed and slept well,” Mark Thatcher said outside the Chelsea and Westminster Hospital in west London, following his brief visit. “It’s just a question of time to let these things heal and go from there really.”
Asked how her arm was, he said: “It’s too early to tell but she seems to be in very good spirits.
“She’s fine. She’s still slightly got some medications going on but she’s in very good form. Recovering well,” he said.
Thatcher gave up public speaking in 2002 on the advice of her doctors after a series of small strokes, although she still attends public engagements, notably for the Conservative Party.
Last week she took part in an event at the Carlton Club in central London to celebrate the 30th anniversary of her May 1979 general election win, which launched 18 years of Conservative government.
Thatcher, a Methodist, had an informal exchange with Pope Benedict XVI after she attended his weekly general audience at the Vatican City on May 27. The pair shook hands and had a brief conversation.
Friday’s incident is only the latest scare for Thatcher, who has looked increasingly frail in recent years.
Her daughter Carol last year told how her mother’s dementia has left her struggling to remember simple facts.
Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) is to visit Russia next month for a summit of the BRICS bloc of developing economies, Chinese Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi (王毅) said on Thursday, a move that comes as Moscow and Beijing seek to counter the West’s global influence. Xi’s visit to Russia would be his second since the Kremlin sent troops into Ukraine in February 2022. China claims to take a neutral position in the conflict, but it has backed the Kremlin’s contentions that Russia’s action was provoked by the West, and it continues to supply key components needed by Moscow for
Japan scrambled fighter jets after Russian aircraft flew around the archipelago for the first time in five years, Tokyo said yesterday. From Thursday morning to afternoon, the Russian Tu-142 aircraft flew from the sea between Japan and South Korea toward the southern Okinawa region, the Japanese Ministry of Defense said in a statement. They then traveled north over the Pacific Ocean and finished their journey off the northern island of Hokkaido, it added. The planes did not enter Japanese airspace, but flew over an area subject to a territorial dispute between Japan and Russia, a ministry official said. “In response, we mobilized Air Self-Defense
CRITICISM: ‘One has to choose the lesser of two evils,’ Pope Francis said, as he criticized Trump’s anti-immigrant policies and Harris’ pro-choice position Pope Francis on Friday accused both former US president Donald Trump and US Vice President Kamala Harris of being “against life” as he returned to Rome from a 12-day tour of the Asia-Pacific region. The 87-year-old pontiff’s comments on the US presidential hopefuls came as he defied health concerns to connect with believers from the jungle of Papua New Guinea to the skyscrapers of Singapore. It was Francis’ longest trip in duration and distance since becoming head of the world’s nearly 1.4 billion Roman Catholics more than 11 years ago. Despite the marathon visit, he held a long and spirited
China would train thousands of foreign law enforcement officers to see the world order “develop in a more fair, reasonable and efficient direction,” its minister for public security has said. “We will [also] send police consultants to countries in need to conduct training to help them quickly and effectively improve their law enforcement capabilities,” Chinese Minister of Public Security Wang Xiaohong (王小洪) told an annual global security forum. Wang made the announcement in the eastern city of Lianyungang on Monday in front of law enforcement representatives from 122 countries, regions and international organizations such as Interpol. The forum is part of ongoing