Richard Lord

Hours be­fore Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar's sched­uled re­turn home she was hos­pi­talised in Bar­ba­dos for "a bat­tery of tests." Act­ing Prime Min­is­ter Jack Warn­er said that dur­ing a hasti­ly arranged news con­fer­ence at the Of­fice of the Prime Min­is­ter in St Clair yes­ter­day.

"Ladies and gen­tle­men, fel­low cit­i­zens, I have just been ad­vised that the Prime Min­is­ter has been ad­mit­ted to the Queen Eliz­a­beth Hos­pi­tal in Bar­ba­dos," Warn­er said. Warn­er said he spoke with the PM pri­or to her ad­mis­sion and she as­sured me that she will ral­ly through. Warn­er said he con­tact­ed Bar­ba­dos Fre­un­del Stu­art "who has as­sured me that he would do every­thing pos­si­ble to en­sure her com­fort and care."

Warn­er said Per­sad-Bisses­sar's fam­i­ly have been in­formed. He said fur­ther bul­letins will be giv­en to the na­tion as re­ports of the PMs con­di­tion was made avail­able.

Warn­er s aid he want­ed to join the rest of the na­tion to wish Per­sad-Bisses­sar a speedy re­cov­ery. An Op­po­si­tion leader Dr Kei­th Row­ley last night said he wished Per­sad-Bisses­sar a "speedy re­cov­ery" and hoped that her ill­ness was "noth­ing too se­ri­ous."

Per­sad-Bisses­sar was hos­pi­talised for two days at St Clair Med­ical Cen­tre in Port-of-Spain in Oc­to­ber last year. She lat­er told re­porters she was a di­a­bet­ic and suf­fers with high blood pres­sure. She said she was sup­posed to have reg­u­lar med­ical check ups but had not had one for a while.

Per­sad-Bisses­sar was one day away from her sched­uled re­turn to Port-of-Spain af­ter a sev­en day of­fi­cial trip to Be­lize, the Unit­ed States and Bar­ba­dos.

Per­sad-Bisses­sar cel­e­brat­ed her 60th birth­day last month.