Cause of Prince's death may not be made public for weeks

The American musician was pronounced dead at his Paisley Park estate near Minneapolis on Thursday.

A post-mortem examination took place on the 57-year-old’s body yesterday, where information about his “medical and social history” was gathered, the Midwest Medical Examiner’s Office said.

Celebrity news website TMZ reported that Prince had overdosed on a painkiller called Percocet when his private jet made an emergency landing in Atlanta, Georgia, on April 15.

The Purple Rain star was taking the drug for a hip problem after having corrective surgery around six years ago, TMZ said. A spokeswoman for the Midwest Medical Examiner’s Office said it would not release information from the post-mortem examination until “all results are obtained” and the findings of a toxicology scan “could likely take weeks”.

Tributes have flooded in for the singer. US president Barack Obama described Prince as a “creative icon.”