There had been a ‘dramatic deterioration’ in her health in recent months, giving her only around a year left to live without a transplant
2-MIN READ2-MIN ListenReutersPublished: 9:35pm, 5 Jun 2026Norway’s Crown Princess Mette-Marit has been placed on a waiting list for a lung transplant after a significant deterioration in her health that likely gave her only a year left to live without the surgery, her doctors said on Friday.
The 52-year-old wife of Crown Prince Haakon, the heir to the Norwegian throne, was diagnosed with pulmonary fibrosis in 2018, a chronic disease that causes scarring in the lungs and leads to a reduced oxygen uptake.
Oslo’s University Hospital in December said the time was approaching when a transplant must be performed, and that the crown princess had not yet been placed on Norway’s list of possible recipients.
But in recent months there had been a “dramatic deterioration” in Mette-Marit’s condition, giving her only around a year left to live, Oslo University Hospital Professor Are Holm told a press conference on Friday.
“It is a major and demanding operation, and you have to be sick enough to need it, while at the same time healthy enough to withstand the surgery and the difficult course of treatment,” Holm told reporters.
The royal palace in a statement said Mette-Marit’s condition was “life-threatening”.
