CAIRO - Hosni Mubarak may be hit by a stroke at any time, a senior official in the prison where the Egyptian ex- president is serving a life imprisonment said Saturday.

Mubarak's health is seriously deteriorating, and he is having irregular heart beats and difficulties in breathing, the official in Cairo's Torah prison was quoted by the official news agency MENA as saying.

Mubarak is suffering a breakdown and has been put on the ventilator for long hours, the source said, adding that he is likely to be transferred to a military hospital.

The Egyptian former president was put in prison last week after a criminal court in Cairo sentenced him to a life imprisonment for charges of complicity in killing protestors.

His wife Suzanne and daughters-in-law have visited him in the prison, the official said.