In his later years, Fang suffered kidney disease. In 2011, he openly supported the prerequisite of being patriotic to China to be a popularly-elected Chief Executive of Hong Kong, while calling his sister Anson Chan, a pan-democrat, one of Hong Kong's "Gang of Four". Fang fell from his apartment on 3 November 2013 at the age of 72; he was suspected of committing suicide because of illness.
