The playboy king of Thailand's princess daughter suffered a massive heart attack while jogging with her dogs and is now on life support. Princess Bajrakitiyabha of Thailand, who is the next in line to the throne, is reportedly "unlikely to recover" after CPR efforts failed to revive her, and had to be rushed to the hospital.
Initial reports claimed that she died following the heart attack although her chances of survival are almost nil. Local news is reporting that she was given CPR for more than an hour, but is now "unlikely to recover". Thailand's Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha has flown back early from an overseas trip.
Fighting With Death
Princess Bajrakitiyabha, 44, fell and lost consciousness while running during a military dog training practice on Wednesday night in the Khao Yai National Park in the Nakhon Ratchasima region of central Thailand.
In the early hours of today morning, the princess, who is being lined up to succeed her father King Maha Vajiralongkorn, was flown from the Pack Chong Nana Hospital to the King Chulalongkorn Memorial Hospital in Bangkok.
Journalist Andrew Marhsall, who broke the news, wrote on Twitter: "Several royal sources say Princess Bajrakitiyabha suffered a heart attack today while running with her dogs in Khao Yai national park. "Her father King Vajiralongkorn rushed there in a helicopter.
"Some sources are saying that despite CPR being carried out for more than an hour, there was no response and she has been put on an ECMO machine, which basically means she is dead but being artificially kept alive.
"She is just 44 so it's very unusual that she would have heart failure but this is what my sources are telling me."
Princess Bajrakitiyabha is being kept alive with a life-support machine. Prime minister Prayut Chan-ocha also cut short his foreign trip and returned home early.
The Thai Palace also issued a statement on Thursday morning confirming that the princess had lost consciousness. The statement, in Thai, states: "Her Majesty is sick.
"Her condition stabilized to a certain extent."
The lengthy statement attests to the fact that she was in the Nakhon Ratchasima Province "training" with her dog outside in a military area.
Complete Uncertainty
Author and lecturer Andrew MacGregor Marshall, a Thai royal scholar, told DailyMail.com that the outlook was "very grim" and that the monarchy, which imprisons critics, would collapse. The episode, according to MacGregor, has "huge repercussions" for the Thai monarchy because Princess Bajrakitiyabha was set to succeed the contentious "crop top king" Vajiralongkorn.
The reigning Thai king sparked public outrage after it was revealed that he spent a significant portion of the coronavirus outbreak in Germany with a rumored entourage of "sex soldiers" assembled as a military unit at a four-star hotel,
Seven children were born to the 70-year-old king through his three prior marriages, all of which ended in divorce. Princess Bajrakitiyabha is the only child of King Vajiralongkorn and his first wife, Princess Soamsawali.
King Vajiralongkorn exiled his first four male heirs from their native land when the monarch accused their mother Sujarinee Vivacharawongse of infidelity in 1996.
"Princess Bajrakitiyabha was initially taken to Pak Chong Nana Hospital where CPR was attempted for hours without success. King Vajiralongkorn rushed to the hospital in a military helicopter," McGregor said.
"Royal sources say the prognosis for the princess is very grim and it's very unlikely she will ever recover. But she could potentially be kept artificially alive via ECMO for weeks or even months while the regime figures out what to do."
Three large military helicopters were also reportedly seen returning to Bangkok from Khao Yai unusually late at night on Wednesday. From there, Princess Bajrakitiyabha was taken to Bangkok Hospital for ECMO treatment with witnesses reportedly seeing a hospital helicopter flanked by two military choppers.
