Sen. Tim Melson, R-Florence, suffered a cardiac event while visiting South Korea.

Melson was in Seoul when he was stricken, Alabama Republican Party Chair John Wahl said in a statement.  Information on Melson’s condition was not immediately available on Friday morning.

Wahl said Melson had suffered a heart attack, a blockage of the arteries. It was reported Thursday that State Sen. Arthur Orr, R-Decatur, who was among the legislators on the trip, administered CPR to Melson.

Ellie Melson, the senator’s daughter, wrote in a Facebook post that Melson suffered a cardiac arrest, when the heart suddenly stops beating. A cardiac arrest can be brought on by a heart attack.

Ellie Melson wrote that she was traveling to see her father in South Korea. Sen. Keith Kelley, R-Anniston, asked for prayers in a Facebook post.

“They were able to resuscitate him, but he is in critical condition. I wish we had more info — the information we have beyond this is minimal,” she wrote Thursday night.

“As you can imagine, the language barrier and time difference has been a challenge. Please pray for the team who is caring for him and that we make the best decisions for him in the upcoming days/weeks/months.”

Melson was first elected to the Alabama Senate in 2014 and won re-election in 2018 and 2022. He chairs the Senate’s Health Care Committee.

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The senator, a retired anesthesiologist, played a major role in the creation of Alabama’s medical cannabis program. Previous attempts to establish a program had never moved further than committee votes, but the Legislature’s approval of Carly’s Law, a 2014 statute authorizing a CBD study at the University of Alabama Birmingham, opened a door.

Melson first introduced a bill establishing a medical cannabis program in 2019 and brought it back in 2020. The bills passed the Senate both years but faced opposition in the House. The lower chamber amended the 2019 bill into a study committee, where many patients later testified about the relief that cannabis brings them. The 2020 bill passed just before the first case of COVID-19 was confirmed in the state, leading to a truncated legislative session.

Melson brought the bill back in 2021, working with Rep. Mike Ball, R-Madison, who had fought for Carly’s Law. The final bill authorized medical cannabis use for 16 different conditions, including cancer, chronic pain and sickle-cell anemia. The law limits cannabis consumption to tablets, capsules, gelatins and vaporized oils. Smoking cannabis or consuming it in edibles is forbidden under the law.

The bill passed the Senate in 2021 but faced another difficult fight in the House, with about a half-dozen legislators conducting a rare Republican-led filibuster against the measure. But many other representatives shared emotional stories about the relief that cannabis had given or could have given to their loved ones. The bill passed 68 to 34 and was signed by Gov. Kay Ivey.

“I was skeptical five years ago,” Melson said in 2021, after the Senate approved his bill for the third time. “I started listening to people, to the patients instead of the biased people, and this is where we’re at today.”

The Alabama Medical Cannabis Commission is currently in the process of granting licenses amid controversy over the evaluation process.

AL.com contributed to this report.