What Happened To Queen Elizabeth II? British Monarch Missing New Year Service Due To Illness

Queen Elizabeth II skipped the annual New Year church service Sunday as the British monarch is still too unwell. A U.K. journalist, citing the Buckingham Palace, tweeted that the 90-year-old will not be attending service at Sandringham due to “a lingering heavy cold.”

The move will likely raise concerns over the queen’s health especially since the monarch also skipped the Christmas Day service over a heavy cold.

“The Queen is continuing to recover from her heavy cold and is still in the residence of Sandringham. We probably will not know what is happening until the morning,” a spokesperson for the Palace reportedly said Saturday.

The monarch has not been seen in public for days as she and her husband, Prince Philip, duke of Edinburgh, have both caught colds. Their sickness affected the couple’s traditional trip by train to their north Norfolk estate. The royal pair instead flew from the palace by helicopter.

The queen missed the Christmas Day service at St Mary Magdalene church in Sandringham for the first time in decades. However, 95-year-old Prince Philip was well enough to attend church on Dec. 25 with Prince Charles, Prince Harry and other members of the royal family.

In recent days, several false news stories reporting the queen’s death have been circulating on social media. Recently a fake BBC news account tweeted that the queen had passed away forcing the Palace to issue a statement denying the tweet, saying the queen was still alive.

However, preparations for her funeral have already been in place for years and the arrangements are regularly updated in consultation with the queen herself.

“Obviously we all hope such a sad event will be a long way off - yet we need to rehearse the logistics and timings for what will be a huge ceremony,” a royal aide said back in 2011. “The Queen, who is very pragmatic about this sort of thing, knows about the dry run. The arrangements are reviewed annually and any significant changes have to be approved by her. There's no sentimentality involved on her part; she actually takes rather a keen interest in the details.”

The 90-year-old’s health condition has sparked questions about who will succeed her should she choose to give up the throne, retire or if she dies. Her eldest son Prince Charles is first in line for the throne of England followed by Prince William, Prince George and Princess Charlotte.