Former People’s National Party (PNP) Senator, Delano Franklyn, has died.

He had been ailing for some time.

Last September, Franklyn was hospitalised at the University Hospital of the West Indies (UHWI). At the time, there was an urgent appeal for blood for him, with general secretary of the PNP Dr Dayton Campbell disclosing that he needed up to 10 units per day.

A long-standing member of the PNP, Franklyn was 63 years old. He previously served as minister of state in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

He was also a businessman and attorney, and was the managing partner of the law firm Wilson & Franklyn, which was founded in 1998.

He received his secondary education at Kingston College and his tertiary education at the Mico Teachers College (now Mico University College), the University of the West Indies, and the Norman Manley Law School.

He is a former chairman of the Governance Committee of the Mico University College, the Coffee Industry Board, the Michael Manley Foundation, and the Asafa Powell Foundation.

In 1999 he was appointed a Justice of the Peace and in 2000 he was named one of the distinguished graduates of Mico University College and received the Millennium Award.

In 2016, he shared publicly that he was hospitalised with Guillain-Barre Syndrome (GBS) after he was infected with the mosquito-borne Zika virus. He detailed his struggles with the life-threatening disease, which results in muscle weakness when the immune system causes damage to the peripheral nervous system.