At his age and given his condition,
there's no way they could not have been expecting it. Having been in a similar situation with my own parent, you get to a point where you know every day is borrowed time. And from what we know, royal protocols have had the funeral planned and all the announcements/press-releases ready to roll out for a very long time. That's not unique to Prince Philip - it's similar for all of them.
Interesting comment and I thought exactly the same thing. I
t would never have happened here in Canada within our health system either - never. One must assume though that the Royal Family has a medical staff that operates outside the NHS and perhaps your system also includes private, for-a-fee hospitals?