Doctors said on Monday that Pope Francis is no longer in imminent danger of death as a result of pneumonia that has kept him hospitalized for almost a month, but has decided to keep him hospitalized for several more days to receive treatment.
In a late update, doctors said the 88 -year -old Pope remains stable and has consolidated improvements in recent days, as determined by blood tests and positive responses to drug treatments.
The Vatican said that doctors had raised their previous “guarded” prognosis, which means that they determined that it was no longer in imminent danger as a result of the original respiratory infection with which it arrived on February 14. But his precaution remained.
“However, in view of the complexity of the clinical image and the important infectious image presented to admission, it will be necessary to continue the medical drug therapy in a hospital for additional days,” according to the Vatican's statement.
In a sign of his best health, Francis followed the spiritual retreat of a week of the Vatican through videoconference on Monday in the morning and afternoon sessions.
As he did on Sunday, Francis participated in the retirement remotely from the Hospital of Rome, where he is being treated. He could see and listen to Reverend Roberto Pasolini, preacher of the papal house, but the priests, bishops and cardinals gathered for the retirement in the Vatican auditorium could not see it or listen to it.
Pasolini is delivering a series of meditations this week about “The Hope of Eternal Life”, a topic chosen long before Francis was admitted to the Gemelli Hospital in Rome on February 14 with a complex lung infection.
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The withdrawal, an annual meeting that begins the solemn Lent season of the Catholic Church that leads to Easter, continues during the week. The Vatican has said that Francis would participate “in the spiritual communion” with the rest of the hierarchy, from afar.
Francis also resumed his physical and respiratory therapy at the Gemelli hospital, and rested and prayed in the middle. Francis has been using a nasal tube for supplementary oxygen to help him breathe during the day and a non -invasive mechanical ventilation mask at night, therapy that continued on Monday.
The 88 -year -old Pope, who has chronic lung disease and had part of a lung that was young, had what was just a bad case of bronchitis when he was hospitalized last month. The infection progressed to a complex infection of the respiratory tract and double pneumonia that has set aside Francis during the longest period of his 12 -year -old papacy and raised questions about the future.
Francis still watched things. The Vatican said he had been informed about floods in his native Argentina and expressed his proximity to the affected population. In addition, a Vatican cardinal near Francis spoke on Monday to refute some negative media reports that have circulated in his absence.
The Vatican Development Office published a letter written by Cardinal Michael Czerny to one of Francis's close friends, the Argentine social justice activist Juan Grabois. Graboois had traveled to Rome to pray for Francis at the Gemelli Hospital, and some Italian media reported last month that he had tried to force the hospital suite of the 10th floor of Francis, a claim he denied.
In the letter of March 6, Czerny told Grade that Francis “knew of his presence in Rome and his daily vigils of spiritual prayer and solidarity in Gemelli Polyclinic and I am sure that this gave him a real comfort and support.”
“In addition, I know that you go to me to strongly repudiate the unfounded versions that have circulated in some media on alleged inappropriate behaviors in the hospital,” Czerny wrote.
The Vatican is always full of rumors, but it has been overloaded with the speculation about Francis's health and talking about agreements, despite the fact that Francis is already very alive. The fact that Czerny felt necessary to defend one of Francis's friends suggested that the rumor and maneuver in the absence of Francis had crossed a line.
On Thursday, the Vatican will mark the 12th anniversary of Francis's elections, the first with the Pope out of view but still in charge. Francis was chosen on the 266th Pope, the first Jesuit Pope and the first in Latin America on March 13, 2013, after the resignation of Pope Benedict XVI.
& Copy 2025 the Canadian press