The Pope's health: Francis' kidney failure has resolved and his clinical condition shows a "further slight improvement"
ROME.- The Pope , 88, who on Wednesday completed his 13th day in the Gemelli hospital, remains in a stable condition but is slowly improving . Although he has resumed some activities and is showing slight improvements in his fragile and complex clinical condition, his prognosis remains reserved.
" The Holy Father's clinical condition has shown a slight improvement over the past 24 hours ," said the report prepared by the medical team treating him, announcing that "the mild renal insufficiency observed in recent days has subsided," which is very good news.
"The chest CT scan performed yesterday afternoon showed a normal evolution of the lung inflammation," he said, which seemed to indicate that the bilateral pneumonia (in both lungs) is still there, despite the heavy treatment he is undergoing.
"Today's macrocytometric and blood chemistry tests confirmed yesterday's improvement," the report added, adding that "the Holy Father continues high-flow oxygen therapy " and that he did not have asthmatic respiratory crises on Wednesday either."
“Respiratory physiotherapy continues,” the report added, providing a detail that many had imagined but had never been said. “Although there has been a slight improvement, the prognosis remains reserved ,” it continued.
A phrase that, as they have been explaining in recent days to journalists who know nothing about medicine, means that “although he is not at risk of death, he is not out of danger either” , as one of his doctors, surgeon Sergio Alfieri, stated in the press conference last Friday, an event that could be repeated in the coming days. “During the morning the Holy Father received the Eucharist” and “the afternoon was dedicated to work activities”, the report concluded.
Annalisa Bilotta, a doctor at the Salvator Mundi International Hospital in the capital, stressed that for her, the fact that doctors say that the CT scan showed “a normal evolution of the pulmonary inflammation” can mean “everything and nothing.”
When asked by LA NACION, she considered that this formula could indicate between the lines that “we have to wait and that the situation is stationary.” Otherwise, she considered that it was a report “very similar” to the previous ones because the prognosis remains reserved, beyond the slight improvements in the blood tests and the remission of the kidney failure. Although she considered it good that he had not had more respiratory crises.
“The Pope has had a peaceful night and is resting,” papal spokesman Matteo Bruni had said in the morning, without giving further details. Vatican sources had also said that the Pope was continuing with his therapy, “sitting in an armchair” and that he was continuing to eat normally. And that his general clinical condition remained the same as indicated in yesterday’s report: “critical, but stable.” In a more than positive development, it had also been indicated that the Pope had resumed, albeit in a mild way, his work. Something that was evident when it was reported yesterday that he received on Monday Cardinal Pietro Parolin, Secretary of State and number two, and the Venezuelan Archbishop Edgar Peña Parra, to sign the decrees of some new saints and blesseds and to call a consistory of cardinals for canonization causes, but without a date.
In a climate of great tension, speculation of all kinds and fake news , this visit, which the Vatican formally called an “audience,” raised several questions . Not only because many remembered that Benedict XVI announced his decision to resign precisely during a consistory, which is a solemn meeting of cardinals to discuss certain issues, in this case, for canonization causes, on February 11, 2013. But also because it is normal for these issues to be handled by the Dicastery for the Causes of Saints and not by Cardinal Parolin or Monsignor Peña Parra. Why did they go?
The most appropriate person to answer that question was Cardinal Marcello Semeraro, prefect of the Dicastery for the Causes of Saints, who, in an interview with Corriere della Sera , explained that it was he who sent the Pope a folder with the decrees to sign, through the Secretariat of State . As is known, due to his delicate condition and reserved prognosis, the Pope does not receive visitors, except in exceptional cases. “I agreed with the Pope that I would have sent him the folder through Parolin and Peña Perra,” said Semeraro, noting that he already had in his possession the documents with Francis’ tiny signature and the date of Monday, February 24, which he defined as “a sign of hope.”
“When they told me that he had signed the decrees, I said to myself , 'this way, someone will be able to convince themselves that they are not dying'. Of course, there are difficulties, which have to do with health conditions and age. But, joking a bit, I could also say that perhaps all this will serve as a lesson for him to calm down and take better care of himself in the future,” he reflected.
Francisco, in fact, had to be hospitalized on Friday, February 14, after suffering for weeks from a bad case of bronchitis that he treated at home in Santa Marta, which, due to his obstinacy to continue forward, did not stop his agenda of audiences, even outdoors, exposing himself to the cold. In those weeks, when he was seen with his face swollen from the corticosteroids, he himself publicly admitted to having difficulty breathing, excusing himself and giving his texts to a collaborator to read.
Semeraro, 77, is very close to Francis, whom he met when he was cardinal archbishop of Buenos Aires in September 2001, when he was special secretary at the tenth assembly of the synod of bishops and the general relator, the archbishop of New York [Edward Egan], had to return to the United States due to the attack on the Twin Towers and Bergoglio replaced him. Since then they forged a friendship and when Bergoglio was elected in 2013, he appointed him secretary of the Council of Cardinals and then, in 2020, prefect of the so-called “factory of saints.”
It is not for nothing that Semeraro highlighted “the strength of mind” of his top boss , which he considered “fundamental to be able to sustain this situation and react without ever getting depressed.” “It is not only that psychological energy that can be seen in many people, but it is something different, deeper. It is an inner spiritual force, which is what he referred to with the famous phrase 'you govern with your head, not with your legs'. Mental lucidity, of course, but also the fact that Francis feeds his days with long moments of prayer. It is like when he fills up his gas tank before a long trip: he gets up every morning before dawn and dedicates at least two hours to personal prayer,” he stressed.
Demonstrating that the Vatican machinery does not stop even though the Pope remains ill and hospitalized, the Vatican in its daily midday bulletin also on Wednesday announced four new bishop appointments . It also released a papal chirograph , that is, a decree, entitled “ Commissio de donationibus pro Sancta Sede” with which Francis created a permanent commission dedicated to collecting donations and offerings for the Apostolic See, “considering the current economic situation.” The decree, which says that the task of the commission will be to “encourage donations, with specific campaigns before the faithful, episcopal conferences and other potential benefactors,” was signed by the Pontiff on February 11, three days before he was hospitalized.
He also published the catechesis that he was supposed to have given at today's traditional Wednesday audience. In this case, Bruni clarified that it is a text that is part of the cycle "Jesus, our hope" on the childhood of Christ, "prepared long ago" by Francis. He wanted to avoid anyone thinking that he was talking about his current situation when he writes that "elder Simeon sees death not as the end, but as the realization, as plenitude, he awaits it as a 'sister' who does not destroy, but introduces into the true life that he has already tasted and in which he believes," reflecting on that part of the Gospel that narrates the encounter with the child Jesus in the temple.
Father Gabriel Romanelli , the parish priest of Gaza with whom the Pope has been in daily contact for more than 15 months, who received a call from the hospital on Monday after a few days of silence, according to the Vatican, finally described “this blessed call” on his YouTube channel. “As he has done every day since the beginning of this terrible war, Pope Francis has called us once again to show his closeness, to pray for us and to give us his blessing,” he said. “As the Parish of the Holy Family of Gaza, which belongs to the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem, we are happy to hear his voice. Which is always comforting,” he added. “Knowing that despite his delicate state of health, he continues to think and pray for everyone, for Peace in Gaza and thanking us, at the same time, for our constant prayers, gives us great joy even in the midst of so many trials.”
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