Pele Is Getting Better, Posts Exercise Video
Brazilian football legend Pele, with his usual sense of humor, posted a video on Tuesday showing him exercising on a bicycle, hoping he would be discharged from hospital.
“My friends, I am sending this video that my wife made today to share my joy with you,” Pele, 80, wrote on his Instagram page.
“I am surrounded by passion and encouragement that makes me feel a little better every day. By cycling, in this way, I will soon return to Santos”, in Sao Paulo, where his home is.
The “King” Pele appeared in the video on a bicycle, while two medical staff at Albert Einstein Hospital cheered him on, while one of them said: “Okay, that’s it, champ! Excellent! A little more than that,” to respond to the 3-times world champion. Jokingly extending his tongue as if exhausted.
Pele, who won the World Cup with Brazil in 1958, 1962 and 1970, underwent surgery on September 4 to remove a “suspicious” tumor in his colon that was discovered during routine examinations.
He remained in the intensive care unit until the 14th of it, before being transferred to a normal room, but he returned briefly to the intensive care unit last Friday “as a precaution” due to a minor “respiratory disorder”.
Pele’s health has deteriorated in recent years, and he has been hospitalized several times, most recently in April 2019 in Paris, due to an acute urinary tract infection. On his return to Brazil, a kidney stone was removed.
Pele suffered in November 2014 from an acute urinary tract infection, which forced him to enter the intensive care room and underwent dialysis, amid great concern around the world about the possibility of the death of the player, who is one of the most prominent in history.
Pele has only had one kidney since he was a player, and a rib fracture during a match damaged his right kidney, which was eventually removed.
Pele scored 77 goals in 92 matches with the “Celeção” shirt before retiring in 1977. He was chosen in 1999 by the International Olympic Committee, as one of the best athletes of the twentieth century, and a year later as the best player of the same century by the International Football Association “FIFA”.
Source: AP
