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Crown Princess Mette-Marit of Norway has successfully undergone a lung transplant at an Oslo hospital, the country’s royal house confirmed on Wednesday.
The 52-year-old royal was diagnosed in 2018 with pulmonary fibrosis, a progressive and incurable disease that causes significant damage and scarring to lung tissue, leading to severe breathing difficulties.
Earlier this month, it was announced that she had been placed on a lung transplant list.
The procedure took place at Rikshospitalet in Oslo, and Are Holm, the head of the hospital’s pulmonary department, said: “We are very pleased that everything has gone well so far.”
Like other transplant recipients, she will remain in the hospital for “several weeks”, Dr Holm said.
He added that “this is standard procedure to adjust medications, manage any complications and conduct rehabilitation”.
The royal house said that Crown Prince Haakon, the heir to the Norwegian throne, will “adjust his schedule” to be with his wife during that period.
It said that it plans its next update on her health when she is discharged from the hospital.
Mette-Marit’s condition worsened over recent months, coinciding with a challenging period for her on other fronts.
Norway’s Crown Prince Haakon and Crown Princess Mette-Marit (Reuters)
Her eldest son, Marius Borg Høiby, was sentenced to four years in prison on Monday after being convicted of two counts of rape, which he denied, among other offenses.
Høiby’s lawyers said that he will appeal convictions for rape and domestic abuse.
Høiby is Mette-Marit’s son from a previous relationship son and has no royal titles or official duties. However, his high-profile six-week trial cast a shadow over the royal family.
While the trial played out, Mette-Marit separately faced renewed scrutiny over her connections with the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
That raised questions over her judgment, though she is not accused of any wrongdoing.
She apologised in February for the situation she put the royal family in, part of a broader apology for all those she had “disappointed”.
In a television interview in March, she said she was manipulated and deceived by Epstein and felt unsafe during a 2013 encounter with him at his Palm Beach, Florida, mansion.
