The New York Times reports: Former President Hosni Mubarak’s health has deteriorated so sharply since he was sentenced to life in prison on Saturday that the authorities are close to a decision to return him to a hospital outside the penal system, Interior Ministry officials said on Wednesday

Before his sentencing, Mr. Mubarak had been confined to hospitals but not jailed. Relocating Mr. Mubarak, 84, would stoke five days of street protests over the verdicts handed down against him and several top security officials last weekend in a trial for corruption and the killing of protesters.

On Wednesday, the state news agency said that Mr. Mubarak had suffered several heart attacks, a nervous breakdown, high blood pressure and severe depression since his transfer to a prison hospital. He was in the hospital’s intensive care unit and on a ventilator, the state news agency said.

Security officials said Wednesday that an Interior Ministry medical committee had examined him and recommended moving him to a military hospital or other medical center.

An extraordinary crowd of tens of thousands flooded central squares of the capital and other cities Tuesday night in scenes rivaling the early days of the protests that brought him down. And the outrage has become a powerful but unpredictable variable in the runoff set for June 16 and 17 to decide Egypt’s first competitive presidential election in which Mr. Mubarak’s last prime minister, Ahmed Shafik, faces Mohamed Morsi of the Muslim Brotherhood, Egypt’s largest Islamist group.