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Pope Francis Has Double Pneumonia- Vatican Confirms
According to the Vatican on Tuesday, Pope Francis, who was hospitalized last week, has pneumonia in both of his lungs, but he is in “good spirits.”
“The Holy Father’s clinical condition, the laboratory tests, and the chest X-ray continue to present a complex picture,” the Vatican stated in a statement.
A “polymicrobial infection” that has developed on top of “bronchiectasis and asthmatic bronchitis, and which required the use of cortisone antibiotic therapy, makes therapeutic treatment more complex,” the newspaper stated on Tuesday.
“The follow-up chest CT scan which the Holy Father underwent this afternoon… demonstrated the onset of bilateral pneumonia, which required additional drug therapy,” it said.
After suffering from pleurisy that nearly killed him, the pontiff had a portion of his right lung removed when he was 21.
Plans for his weekly Angelus prayer, which is held on Sunday, have not yet been announced by the Vatican, but it had previously canceled a papal audience on Saturday and stated he would not attend a mass on Sunday.
“Nevertheless, Pope Francis is in good spirits,” it stated.
On his fifth day in the hospital, the pope alternated between resting and praying and reading texts, according to the Vatican.
Francis, who has led the Catholic Church since 2013, was taken to the hospital after struggling for days to read his writings aloud.
Francis is nonetheless a highly active pope, with a packed weekly itinerary and frequent trips abroad, despite his health issues. His Asia-Pacific tour, which spanned four countries and was the largest in both duration and distance, concluded in September 2024.
We wish Pope Francis a quick recovery.